


Everything Was Gone

by BlueMoonsandPinkSuns



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-10-16
Updated: 2014-10-20
Packaged: 2018-02-21 11:10:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 15
Words: 29,673
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2466122
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BlueMoonsandPinkSuns/pseuds/BlueMoonsandPinkSuns
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>AU to S4's "Inmates". Daryl and Beth are on their own, alone, with everything they've ever loved or known gone. But as they journey together in search of their family, they soon realize that the most dangerous trials of their lives are still to come. Absolutely no romance between Beth and Daryl.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I've previously posted this on ff.net and Nine Lives, so anyone looking here has probably seen it already... But no matter! I hope you like it!
> 
> Disclaimer: I do not own or write for TWD or AMC.

Everything was gone.

His home. His friends. His family.

Her.

He had failed, yet again.

He was worthless. He hadn’t even started the fire; that had been Beth. Girl had just seen her father beheaded, and she was functioning better than him.

He hated her. He hated what she represented, the constant reminder. If it weren’t for her, he would have offed himself hours ago.

But she was here. She was alive.

He owed it to Hershel to keep her safe, to help her find a new camp, make sure she was settled before he gave in.

He knew he couldn’t save her. Those baby blue eyes sent tremors through his body whenever he dared look, dredging up horrible memories of the people he couldn’t save.

People he had loved that he had failed.

Merle, eyes bloodshot and aching for flesh.

Judith, eyes soft and new, unsettled.

Sophia, what was supposed to be white, red. Blue completely glazed over.

And, of course. Her mama.

He didn’t allow himself to dwell on the dark thoughts, of the inevitable outcome to her banishment that he had worked out a hundred times in his mind. He couldn’t allow himself to imagine her dying the same way her daughter had. Cold. Alone. Scared.

Turning.

He couldn’t protect Beth. This world wasn’t one for the living, for strong, brave girls. This world took your virtues and turned them to weakness, obliterated them to nothing.

He considered putting her down right now, quick and easy. Hell, for all he knew, he could send her straight into her papa’s arms. That wasn’t wrong, was it? That was merciful, right?

He wished someone would do the same for him.

Beth had been speaking for a while now, but he couldn’t hear her over the din of his guilt. It wasn’t until she stood, grabbed her knife and stomped away into the bushes that his ears decided to open.

“-weak, Daryl! Our family is out there. Maggie, Glenn, Rick. Carl. Judith,” she called out over her shoulder, her voice gaining distance.

He waited as her footsteps stalled, reaching out for his crossbow to go follow her, when he heard them nearing again.

She marched over, furious, finger out to scold.

“You’re being selfish, Daryl. What about Carol? I didn’t even see her. She’s probably loaded down with half a dozen kids and a rifle. Or all alone. And all you’re doing is moping.”

A tinge of anger reared in his gut at her words, but was quickly engulfed by grim acceptance. He was selfish. But Carol was almost certainly dead. No one could survive on their own anymore. He swallowed the lump of raw grief in his throat and brought the heels of his hands to his eyes to staunch the deluge of tears that had threatened since Rick had confessed his crime that morning.

Beth’s tone was softer when she spoke again. “I remember, back home. With Sophia. We all thought – knew- that there weren’t no hope to be had…but you never gave up.”

He plunged his hands deeper into his eye sockets, twisting and turning to ward away the awful flashbacks of barns and writhing bodies, his inner voice being magnified through

Carol’s broken wails.

“And when we all thought she was gone, in the tombs. When we filled an empty grave for her, Daryl. You still found her. You still saved her.”

A small keening sound leaked from his lips as he forced the memories away.

A smile.

Clear, blue eyes.

Her arms around his neck, filled with life and strength even after her ordeal.

Alive.

Beth squatted in front of him, her head tilted to try and catch his covered eyes as heavy, silent sobs heaved his chest and shoulders.

It wasn’t fair. It just wasn’t. After all they had been through, after all she had accomplished… After all that time of building each other up… Just when he was starting to have hope that maybe, just maybe, things could change… That things could be better, could be more, between them…

“What’s so different, Daryl?” she murmured. “You found her once. All by yourself. What’s the difference between now and then?”

He couldn’t believe her. Couldn’t let himself. How was he supposed to track her, when she had left in a car? At some subdivision he had never even been to?

She knew better than to touch him, so instead she stood, nudging his boot with her own.

“Now you have a partner. We’re going to find her. Her and everyone else.”

His throat ached, and he swiped at his nose in fury, angry at himself for crying, for feeling this pain, for being unable to tuck it away where all the other hurt went.

She kicked some dirt onto the fire with finality, turning and reaching out her hand.

Her voice trembled, her chin quavering. “We all have jobs to do. Let’s go do ours.”

And, just like that, he couldn’t be angry. Couldn’t hate her, or be pissed off at her for making it out while the one person he needed, her, was gone. He couldn’t.

The weakness in her voice sobered him, flipping a switch in his mind. His reprieve was over. She had been strong for him, and now it was his turn.

He took her hand and stood, bending down to pick up his crossbow and rifle, one for each shoulder.

He turned. “Let’s start with the train tracks,” he whispered with as much strength as he could muster, an echo of defeat reverberating in his words.

Even if he didn’t find her alive, he still owed it to her to put her down. It was what you did for family, for the people you loved in this world.

And he loved her more than life itself at the moment.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: I do not own or write for AMC or TWD.

They’d been running on empty – literally – for hours. The moon was no longer visible, and the inky black of night had begun to give in to the deep navy of early dawn.

They had reached the railroad hours ago, but finding no traces of the living, had headed west.

Daryl didn’t mention what waited to the east, and Beth didn’t ask.

The sun had begun its ascent when Beth simply stopped walking. Daryl slowed, then turned.

“We need an hour,” she grumbled. “Half an hour for you to sleep, half an hour for me.”

Little girl had grown some balls, but he couldn’t argue. He nodded ambiguously, sealing it with a soft “okay”.

He let her sleep first, under a dying azalea bush that rested just under the forest cover beside the tracks.

He kept the bush in sight as he scavenged for water, berries, mushrooms… Anything they could eat on the run. He considered taking a couple squirrels, but quickly ruled it out. They had already wasted enough time with his pouting the night before.

Plus, for all of Beth’s newfound strength, he doubted she would go for raw, still-warm squirrel guts.

When his search turned up nothing more than a handful of blackberries, he deemed it early enough to wake her.

He bent over her awkwardly, finally settling on poking her shoulder.

She awoke in a flurry, eyes wild. Her voice was strangled, choking on grief and terror. “Daddy!” she yelped desperately.

He didn’t know how to respond to that.

He coughed, then held out the blackberries. “I only need fifteen,” he murmured.

She took them with a sad half-smile, wiping her eyes with the heels of her hands. “Thank you,” she managed quietly, all tremor erased from her voice.

He nodded, settling down, hesitating before he closed his eyes. “Don’t be stupid,” he clipped out. “If you see _anyone_ – alive or dead – you wake me up.”

She scoffed. He could practically feel her eyes rolling. “Okay then, _Rick_.”

He ignored her remark, a fuzzy image of his friend being pummeled by a half-blind man shooting through his thoughts.

He shook his head and closed his eyes, forced himself to sleep.

**oOo**

His dreams had never made sense; had always had a psychedelic, horror-movie kind of feel to them. Even before the Turn, his waking moments before the abyss were intoxicated with terror of what grotesque things his subconscious had planned for him that night.

The dream started out basic enough. He was sitting in Hershel’s farm house, on a bed that was soaked red with blood. It was dark out, and the moans of the dead rolled through the house. He could see shadows of them through the lone window, but an intuition forbade him from looking close.

Hershel stood in front of the old vanity, shaving with one of those old-timey razor blades, the sinister kinds that looked more like a thin, smooth switchblade.

He locked eyes with Daryl through the mirror and smiled.

“Take care of my girls now, son,” he said in that paternal, chiding tone that everyone had come to know so well.

And then he flicked his wrist.

His head hit the floor as Merle stepped through the door, tarnished, antique doorknob held smoothly in his healthy right palm.

Merle raised his hands, placating, as Daryl began to scream, rushing over to the severed head.

“Now, now, baby brother. We’re all gone. You know that.”

Daryl kept right on screaming as he reached the white-haired scalp.

But when he turned Hershel’s head over, it wasn’t Hershel anymore.

Sophia stared up at him, a bloody bullet hole through her forehead, just barely off-center.

Her eyes were clear though, her face it’s natural tan.

The scream died in his throat.

“Sophia?” he asked tentatively.

The blonde girl smiled. “You can’t save us, Daryl. But you can save them.”

Her eyes flicked towards the window, and Merle laughed in that wicked way he had come to fear.

Daryl followed the girl’s gaze to the window.

Carl. Rick. Maggie. Glenn.

Carol. Holding Judith.

They banged against the glass, their bloody maws open to display row after row of shark teeth, eyes glazed, broken fingernails clawing and leaving crimson fingerprints smeared across the cracking glass.

“Go on, baby brother. Let them in. Save them.”

Daryl’s eyes flitted between his brother and the window, panicked, horrified.  A shrill scream was peaking in his throat, when, one by one, the bloody teeth disappeared. The looks of fury morphed to expressions of agony and grief. Their hungry pounding turned to desperate clawing.

Their screaming to crying.

When he looked back at Merle, Beth was standing in his place, her hair high and neat in a no-nonsense ponytail. Her eyes were strong, so strong, and he knew then that she was stronger than him, knew that she would do this when he could not.

 She shot him a look of disgust.

“ _Fine._ I’ll do it.”

She raised her gun at the window, flicking the safety and spreading her legs apart to gain leverage.

The glass was creaking, their cries changing rapidly to screaming, echoing pain and misery.

“Stop! You’ll hurt them,” he begged, tears blurring his vision, leaving hot trails down his cheeks.

She hesitated, then turned to face him again.

The rifle was trained on him.

Her voice was soft, comforting; contrasting starkly with her look of cold determination, hard gaze set in the gaze of a soldier.

“Time to wake up, Daryl,” she sang, a look of murder reflected in those blue eyes.

She pulled the trigger.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let me know what you think!


	3. Chapter 3

She kept her face neutral as the body approached.

She didn’t know if it was alive or not, but if babysitting her made Daryl feel better, she could swallow her pride and wake him up.

He had scared her the night before. The raw hatred, fury, he had unleashed at the prison… It was terrifying. He had always been quiet, broody, reserved, but never had he lost his temper like she had seen the day before. It was like someone had flipped a switch.

And then, afterwards. To say he withdrew was the understatement of the century. He _shut down._ They had walked for hours, her leading wordlessly. Any attempts at conversation were ignored. He didn’t talk. He didn’t even acknowledge he heard her when she asked little things. She had been scared to death he would veer off without her noticing, or up and desert her. She had spent those hours watching him like a hawk, a crick in her neck from the amount of time spent checking over her shoulder.

That first night was the worst. But things had gotten better after he had cried a little.

Well. Maybe crying wasn’t always a bad thing.

She tapped his arm with her boot.

“Time to wake up, Daryl,” she said, a lilt to her voice.

He shot up wordlessly, his face gray, his eyes dark and scared. His hands flew to his weapons as he whipped his face around, looking for a target.

She forced herself not to move, to stand her ground.

He blinked slowly, blearily, at her, then grunted and stumbled to his feet. His eyes flicked over to her, resting when they landed on the gun she held in her small arms.

“Let’s get going,” he muttered, face ashen.

She made herself give him a half smile. “Not so fast, Leader.”

She nodded towards the shambling figure that was slowly making its way from the east.

He whirled around at lightning speed, bringing his crossbow up to his eye at the same moment. One fluid motion.

She leapt over to put a hand on his bicep, pushing the bow down. “Don’t. Don’t do it. You don’t have to.”

He side-eyed her in annoyance, and pushed her away with a roll of his shoulders. He slung off the rifle and hung it on her shoulder, and jogged towards the figure, going quickly across the thick gravel.

She considered waiting. But the body was coming from the east. From the direction of the prison.

She had to know.

She bounded after him in a half-gallop, bouncing loudly in the gravel. She kept her eyes trained on Daryl’s wings. If it was someone she knew…she didn’t want to know until after it was over, when it had already been dealt with.

She wasn’t sure what she would want if it was someone she loved.

He stopped a few feet away from the bloodstained pant legs. She stopped too, her eyes purposely unfocused, waiting.

A quick _fwoosh_ , and she squeezed her eyes shut. Turned around. Took several deep breaths.

She never had really gotten used to it. Didn’t know if she ever would, or if that was a bad thing or not.

She could hear his footsteps on the rocks. She waited until he passed her up, then fell into step beside him.

“Who-,” she started, voice shaking with terror and anxiety. “Who was it?”

He shook his head, staring straight ahead. “No one. Wat’nt nobody we know.”

She brought her hands up to her face, swiping up and down, taking shaky half-breaths as she tried to calm herself down.

“When we were out, getting’ the meds, we came across a herd over there.” He rolled his head to indicate the tracks to the east. “Huge. Biggest one I’ve ever seen. Thousands of them things, easy, all congregated by an overturned boxcar.”

She felt the news cascade over her like a cold fall rain, chilling her to the bone, washing all blood from her face. She broke out in a cold sweat, feeling her heartbeat accelerating dangerously.

She had to get herself under control. She couldn’t do this, not here. Not with Daryl barely hanging on.

“Did you tell anyone?” she spat, trying an air of anger to compensate for the rising panic in her gut.

He shook his head slowly. “Didn’t… Didn’t have time. Too much going on.”

She squeezed her eyes shut again, trying to banish the bad thoughts from her mind. If someone had found their way to the tracks? Gone the wrong way?

There’d be no hope. None.

Her heart started pounding as she imagined Maggie or Glenn going the wrong way, being torn up and eaten alive. Like Jimmy. Patricia. Otis.

She stopped it. She stopped the thoughts right there. She went to her little memory room, and she took each of those lovely people and boxed them up, locking them and stacking them like Christmas presents, and threw away the key.

And then she opened her eyes.

Beth breathed.

And she felt better.

“Let’s get going,” he said, louder than he’d spoken since they had escaped. “We gotta haul ass if we want to make it to one of the evac houses.”


	4. Chapter 4

He stomped ahead of her, trying to burn the image of those little arms leveling the gun to his head from his mind.

_It was just a dream. It was just a dream._

The gravel crunched under his feet, poking through his boots annoyingly. She hadn’t said much the last couple hours.

He supposed it was natural. Maybe the horrors that they had just endured – were yet to endure – were finally dawning on her.

He saw the indents in the rocks where human feet had been, and he had been seeing them for the last hour or so. They had started at an angle, and so he had stolen a quick glance behind him. Sure enough, a mass of footprints were embedded in the mud. He picked out at least three separate sets; a man’s, a teenage boys or a woman’s, and at least one child.

He didn’t tell Beth. He didn’t trust himself to find them in one piece, whoever they were, and he didn’t want to be responsible for the smothering of whatever hope the girl had left.

If they found people, and they were _their_ people, then great.

If not, it would only be him that would be disappointed.

She was slowing, and he knew that. He knew that he needed to suck it up, take some time, and feed them. He was exhausted too, but his stomach had stopped complaining hours ago. He had gone much longer and done much more physical activity with less food than he’d had in the last several days.

But he was terrified that if he stopped, even for just an hour or two, he would lose whoever made those tracks.

He could lose _her._

He knew the notion was ridiculous. He knew it and he didn’t care, and no matter how many times he tried to talk himself out of believing it, the thought came right back to him.

It could be her. Every second counted. In just the blink of an eye, her life could be over, and it could have been just that second that he had taken to feed his physical limitations.

It wasn’t until she stumbled to her knees and didn’t get up that he deemed a couple hours a necessary sacrifice.

He told himself that Carol was a strong woman, that she could take care of herself. Beth was his responsibility.

_It wasn’t Carol. It wasn’t Carol. It could be anyone._

He backtracked to her and grasped her upper arm, hoisting her up. She wobbled against him, protesting weakly, but her eyes were rolling, her skin paler than usual despite the sun, sticky with cold sweat.

He slung her arm over his shoulder and hobbled with her over the rail and down the low slope until they had entered the barest outskirts of forest cover.

He let her down slowly. She slumped against the bark of the pine tree and held up a hand, warding him off. “I’m fine. I’m good. Just…just give me a second.”

He just stared at her for a couple seconds, willing her to call her own bluff.

She didn’t.

He scoffed. “You’re dehydrated,” he said softly, an edge of concern leaking through his voice. He set his gun in her lap, and waited until she grasped the trigger with her finger before he nodded and turned.

“I’m gonna go take a look around, see if I can find some game. Don’t let yourself go to sleep. Holler real loud if you see anyone. Only fire if you absolutely have to.”

She rolled her tired eyes, eyelids drooping. “I think I can handle myself for an hour,” she breathed.

He shook his head, torn. She looked terrible. He wasn’t sure he should leave her, but if he didn’t, she might die. Have a stroke. Something like that. Something bad.

He couldn’t have that on his conscience.

He fumbled with his crossbow, absentmindedly counting the few arrows he had left.

“I’ll be back in less than an hour. If nightfall comes and I’m not back, stay here for the night and try not to let yourself sleep. When you can see, listen for water and find it. Don’t… Don’t be stupid. Just think, and you’ll be fine.” He turned awkwardly, trying to think of any advice he could give her.

Truth was, he knew that if he didn’t bring back something for her to eat or drink, give her time to sleep, she wasn’t going to make it.

The thought spurred him on, anxiety threatening to overtake him as he imagined her being attacked by dead things, unable to protect herself.

Being taken by the living, worse than dead.

**OoO**

He caught three squirrels, and took off on a run to the tracks. Three was enough for now, and if it wasn’t, well, it would be enough for her.

The smell of smoke sent tendrils of terror spiraling in his gut.

He broke through the bushes loudly, his knife high, his crossbow in the other hand.

Beth’s head lolled towards him. “Chill,” she muttered. Her eyes were closed, her face drenched. He had never seen Beth’s hair down in all the time he’d known her, but it had come completely loose from the elastic band that usually held it back.

She was too weak to put it back up.

He leaped into action, skinning and gutting the squirrels methodically, burying the blood and innards deep in the soil and covering it with rocks. The smell of shed blood would attract them anyway, so they needed to do this quick.

He took one of his aluminum bolts out and skewered one of the little rodents on it, walking over to where Beth was.

“Oh yeah,” she said, voice light, eyes still closed. “I made a fire. I’m not that much of an invalid.”

He glanced at her, and she offered a small smile.

He smirked, despite himself. She wasn’t going to go out easy.

He turned his back to her and held the squirrel low over the fire, cooking it quickly. “Was stupid,” he clipped out, forcing the smile from his face. “If I smelled it, anyone else could. Anything else could.”

She scoffed. “I built it low, Mr. Know-It-All. You were coming back soon. I was cold. I knew you’d have some poor thing to eat.”

His ears perked at her words. He turned slowly. “You’re cold?”

Her eyes fluttered open. “It’s chilly out here.”

Daryl slowly shook his head.

“No. It’s not. It’s Georgia.”

She closed her eyes and shrugged quickly, arms shuddering visibly as she crossed them over her torso.

He handed the now-charred squirrel to her and worked on the other one, keeping his worries to himself.

They finished off two of the squirrels easily, but since they had nothing to carry the third in, he made Beth eat it. She looked much better, but her skin still looked clammy. He didn’t miss the shivers that travelled down her spine every couple minutes, but he figured that if it were serious, she would say something.

If it were truly serious, she would tell him, wouldn’t she? She wasn’t stubborn enough to walk herself to death?

They picked up the pace after that, and Beth kept up well enough. She kept a rifle on her shoulder, having surrendered Daryl’s back to him. He had tried to take them both from her, but she had given him a death glare he had only ever gotten from her sister, so he backed off.

He knew it was heavy though. Too heavy for her.

The tracks were leading them towards a small foot bridge that went over the tracks. It was the worst place to walk; valleys were almost always congregated by walkers. The gravity made it easy to fall and difficult to get out of, and he could already see downed bodies strewn out on the rocks ahead.

They had passed their turn off for the evac point a couple hundred yards back. He knew Beth didn’t know how to get there, so he took advantage of it and kept following the railroad, keeping up with the footprints.

He hesitated when they came to the underside of the bridge. There was a map there that showed the railway stations, and the intersecting railroads. It was markered over with what appeared to be coal.

He read the sign quickly and tried to swallow his doubt. If this was Carol, he understood her not going to the evac points. She had been banished, and the last time Rick had had a disagreement with someone in the group, he had killed him.

But whoever she was with… If they were part of the council, they would have turned off.

 _If_ this was Carol.

It probably wasn’t, and it dawned on him for the millionth time that day how stupid he had been, was being. This was, most likely, not Carol. He had to accept that, get over it, move on.

But he would never know if he didn’t follow through.

He buried his hands in his hair, trying to make a decision that could cost him and Beth their lives.

Beth was staring at something in the bushes. He followed her gaze, but all he saw was a white-something-or-other. Not important.

He turned as she broke off in a sprint towards the thing.

He almost called out to her to come back when she started laughing, wiping tears from her face. She swiped some snot from her nose, her laughter only increasing.

He just stood. And watched. And waited.

She finally straightened, her face blotchy, the biggest grin he had seen her wear in months on her face.

“It’s a diaper. Huggies, 6-9 months. Little Cookie Monsters on the outside.”

He dropped his bow. And his gun. And he laughed, too.


	5. Chapter 5

Beth took the lead after that.

She sprinted ahead, boots pounding on the ground. She didn’t falter as her breath came out in wheezing coughs, as her legs trembled as they hit the gravel. She was determined, had found her hope.

Daryl was glad, he supposed. If he could be _glad_ anymore.

She ran until he yelled for her to slow down.

“They’re just ahead!” she gasped, wiping the sweat from her flushed forehead. “Someone has Judith, and they’re just ahead of us! We have to hurry!”

He doubled over, crossbow and rifle slipping from his shoulders onto the gravel.

“Just… Slow down… We can’t keep up like this…” He shook his head slowly, squinting up at her.

Her eyes were too bright, wild, a crazy Joker grin plastered on her face.

“They’re so close, Daryl! I can _feel_ it. I know it.”

Her voice, its intensity, scared him.

He stood up slowly and appraised their location, trying to listen and call back memories of the railway map at the same time.

He smirked, hearing what he needed to.

He pointed up the slope to their left. “I saw a river on the map. We need to get some water in us, and then we we’ll come back,” he tried.

She shook her head vigorously. “I’m not thirsty. We need to move. Let’s go.”

He stared at her, worry etching lines across his forehead. “It’s getting dark. We haven’t had anything to drink in over 24 hours.”

Her eyebrows drew in slowly as she pondered his words.

He waited, staring her down.

Beth sighed loudly, rolling her eyes as she stomped over the small hill and started climbing, scrambling over the patchy grass, grabbing onto roots and weeds for leverage as she went.

**oOo**

He knew they were close by the persistent buzzing in his ears.

He slapped at the mosquitoes reflexively, cursing to himself, praying against fate for a can of Off.

They didn’t bother with boiling the water. The river was relatively clear, and was flowing, so Daryl deemed it safe enough.

Plus, they didn’t exactly have anything to boil it with.

They squatted there for several minutes, sipping silently, straining to listen for the sounds of the dead over the mosquitoes and the river.

And the screeching cicadas.

Daryl hated the sound. Cicadas had always meant the beginning of summer in the old world, and summer meant a whole lot of father-son bonding time.

And no free lunches.

But even in this new world, the cicadas dredged up bad memories. Particularly of a summer spent in a tent by a big white house and a barn filled with horrors that would haunt him every day for the rest of his life.

He didn’t like cicadas.

He doubted Beth even registered the noise. She hadn’t proven his paranoia yet, what with her sweating so damn much, shivering every couple minutes. He tried to tell himself it was just a little case of heat exhaustion, maybe some dehydration mixed in. Something he could fix. Something that she wouldn’t die from.

He knew something wasn’t right.

He tried convincing himself she couldn’t be sick. She never had had fence duty. She was always with Judith, or helping Carol with the kids, or helping her daddy with whatever he did. She never came in contact with the fence walkers, and as soon as Patrick happened, she was sent with the kiddies into quarantine.

So she couldn’t have gotten sick.

But _something wasn’t right._

And he was beginning to think that she may not tell him if she were truly feeling bad. That she may just walk herself until her heart exploded, or gave out, and he would be none the wiser until she fell to the ground, dead.

Beth stood to start the trek back to the little valley. Her eyes were scary blue, standing out against her pink flesh like light bulbs, floodlights, daring him to challenge her, to try and hold her back from her baby.

She set off at a brisk trot, leaving Daryl to scramble to his feet as she made her way to the slope.

He knew she thought he didn’t want to find Judith, that he was indifferent to the little girl. But that just wasn’t true. He loved her, more than he loved most of the people in his life.

But she was obviously safe. Someone was changing her diapers and keeping her fed and killing the walkers along the railway. Someone was protecting her, had kept her alive this long.

Which was more than he was sure he could do.

But Judith was Beth’s, through and through, had been from day one. Hers and Carol’s.

He swallowed past the lump in his throat.

His hope was wearing thin. The chances of Carol having Judith were close to zero.

So, logically, the tracks should not – could not – belong to Carol.

He knew this.

But it didn’t matter.

He had to know.

And Beth needed to see Judith, to check her over, to kiss her forehead and hold her close. He knew Beth. That baby was her hope.

And he was going to make sure that hope stayed alive.

**OoO**

They walked through the night, taking short breaks every hour or so. He let Beth sleep, and pretended to sleep when she watched for him.

Ha. Like he was going to sleep again.

Daryl hoped that by sleeping little, they could gain on whoever had Judith and maybe catch up with them. If they had the baby, and at least one other kid, they would be sleeping during the night. They’d have to.

Him and Beth, however, did not need to.

They had been skirting dead walkers throughout the night, stumbling over them and nearly face-planting in their blindness. But when the sun broke over the horizon, Daryl noticed something that made his heart sick.

The heads of the walkers they were passing were different than the ones they had seen the day before. These had not been put down by quick, thin blades. These had been bludgeoned to a pulp with a blunt object.

He had seen Tyreese’s victims before. Had seen how he worked with that hammer.

He straightened from the walker he had been inspecting. Beth was watching the rising tree line, gun in arms. She was tapping her foot impatiently.

Daryl kicked it in fury, his stomach nauseous with grief and anger. Anger at himself for ever even considering it could be her. Anger at Rick. Anger at Carol, for admitting to something they all knew damn well she never would have done.

Beth jumped as his boot connected with the thing’s shoulder, squishing into the flesh, and the disgust on her face was almost comical.

 “It’s Tyreese. He has Judith, probably Maggie or Sasha, maybe a couple of the kids, too,” he growled.

Beth’s look of irritation grew into maniacal joy.

“Are you sure?! How do you know?” she laughed out.

He shrugged. Pointed halfheartedly at the gravel as he tried to get himself under control, tried to squelch the lump in his throat that was threatening to overflow.

“One man’s tracks. Someone else, a little smaller. And one or two kids,” he paused, breathing deep.

“Tyreese is the only guy I know who kills walkers with a hammer.”

She threw her head back and laughed louder than he thought he had ever heard her laugh.

He resisted the urge to hush her, and followed meekly behind when she plowed ahead again, blonde ponytail swinging as she galloped away.

He didn’t want to follow her. He wanted to turn around, drop her at the safe house they had passed, and go off and end it. End this. He didn’t care anymore, didn’t want to live like this. Couldn’t fathom a life without her, a life of wondering and guilt and… and emptiness.

He couldn’t live with this…this _nothing._ He couldn’t go back to what he was before. Couldn’t go back to hell now that he’d had a taste of heaven.

But he followed after her anyway, knew whatever argument he could come up with would be swiftly defeated.

But he didn’t understand it.

Nothing made sense. If Tyreese was with Sasha, the most likely option, then they would have turned off at the evac point. If he had Maggie with him, they would both probably know where it was, what with Sasha, Hershel, and Glenn being on the Council.

So why did the tracks carry on? Why would they have found the diaper further out?

The thoughts hurt his head.

_It’s not Carol._

_It’s not Carol._

_It’s not her._

_It’s over._

The words felt blasphemous in his mind.


	6. Chapter 6

The smoke billowed in the sky, tainting the air and burning their nostrils.

They were close. They were really close.

He walked ahead of her, looking up at the smoky pillar rising in the distance.

“How far?” she asked, a little tremor in her voice.

The hairs on the back of his neck stood on end. He turned slowly.

“Couple miles. They haven’t put it out yet, so they’re still there.”

Beth sighed in relief, her face glistening, eyes closed.

He watched her with squinted eyes, and then unslung his gun, handing it to her.

“Let’s take a break. M’gonna go get something for us to eat, an’ you rest. Make a fire if you feel up to it.”

It scared him when she nodded, without even an eye roll.

She started climbing the right slope for wood, and though he knew she could probably take care of herself just fine, the thought of having to put down Hershel’s little girl sent cramps of fear surging deep in his gut.

**oOo**

She was curled into a ball when he slid down the slope, raccoon in hand. Her eyes were squeezed shut, her gun tucked between her stomach and her thighs.

He dropped what he had in his hands and rushed forward, dropping into a crouch beside her. “What’s wrong? You bit? Why didn’t you yell?!” he whisper-screamed, eyes wide, worry etching lines on his forehead.

She shook her head, hair loose and spraying down her back in hazardous knots. Her face contorted and she let out a pitiful moan.

“M’…fine…Just…Stomach hurts…,” she groaned out, shivering and taking a stuttering breath, voice catching lightly.

He shook his head, mildly pissed off. She was sick. A flu, a bug, maybe something worse. He knew she wasn’t going to tell him. He just knew it.

He stomped over to the discarded coon, and started skinning and gutting it, following the procedure methodically, like he had done his whole life. He watched her closely the whole time, wincing when she shuddered and moaned as she rocked slowly, never taking her hands off her gun, finger resting on the trigger, safety off.

A tough girl. Her papa would be proud.

Maybe she was just exhausted. Dehydrated. Maybe the hunger pangs were just too much.

When he went to hand a piece of charred flesh to her, she stuck her hands out, turning her head away, so as to ward him off. She rolled over onto her side and started dry heaving into the dirt, gasping and retching but losing nothing but bile.

He knew how that felt. Her throat was probably raw.

And she was definitely dehydrated now. Sweating bullets, throwing up, was enough to put a horse down if it didn’t have quite enough water.

And they didn’t have any.

But what was he supposed to do? Leave her coiled around her semi-automatic like a snake around a branch, barely holding onto her consciousness, let alone her gun?

No. So she just had to eat, because that was the best they could do.

He wasn’t the doctor. He wasn’t Carol or Hershel. He was the hunter.

He prayed she wouldn’t get any sicker. He couldn’t… He couldn’t let her die. He had to make sure that didn’t happen. He had to do something.

He walked over and tilted her head back. Her eyes were bleary and half-closed, confused and in pain as he felt her forehead.

He sighed a little in relief. “It’s not too bad yet,” he murmured, digging deep to find his compassionate voice. “Think s’just a low grade.”

She closed her eyes, head rolling slightly. “’S just a bug. I’ll… I’ll be okay. I can walk,” she muttered, her voice little more than a breath as she stood shakily, the point of her gun resting on the ground, leaning on it almost like a cane.

He gaped at her. “What’re you doing? Sit down before you _fall_ down,” he commanded, voice losing any attempt at tenderness.

She spared him a fleeting glare as a tremor laced through her small form. Her knees knocked together as she bent forward, leaning on her gun, making a small keening sound as her face scrunched up in pain.

Daryl reached forward and took her rifle, helping her to the ground. He took the raccoon off the spit, kicking the dirt on the fire as he went.

He sat down next to her with the meat.

“You wanna try this again?” he challenged.

Beth looked a little green around the edges, but nodded and took a couple bites.

When she had had as much as she could possibly stomach without hurling, he finished off the rest. He stood and slung the guns on both shoulders, taking his crossbow in one hand, using the other to scoop up Beth and drape her arm around his neck.

“We got a whole day. Let’s try and get to little Asskicker before night falls,” he said to her, forcing a smirk, and she nodded weakly, hair falling and sticking to her face.

They let the pillar of smoke lead them.

**OoO**

“Oh, God,” Beth yelped, hands flying to her lower stomach as she went completely limp.

Daryl dropped his crossbow and felt the guns straps drop to his elbows painfully as he tried to catch her, only partially succeeding.

“Oh God, oh God,” she moaned, curling into the fetal position and clutching at her belly.

“What’s happening?! What is it?!” he demanded back, crouching beside her, trying to unwind her and look for lumps or cuts or bite marks that he knew didn’t exist.

She started crying, making a high pitched sound that was horribly reminiscent to quiet screaming. Tears were cracking her voice and mixing with the sweat on her cheeks.

He moved from her arms to her stomach to her legs, where he immediately stopped.

He felt the blood drain from his face, and then immediately rush to his cheeks. His whole face felt like it was on fire.

“Beth… Beth, calm down. It’s okay. Try to calm down,” he managed, wracking his brain in panic.

She made an indignant sound through her cries.

“Beth… You’re bleeding, Beth,” he tried again, swallowing down his terror and confusion.

She shook her head. “No,” she clipped out, voice wobbling. “It’s not that. I don’t-ohhhhh.”

She curled back up and shuddered, tears pooling and making her eyes swell.

She whimpered once more, and then, like a drop of a hat, it was better.

She uncurled slowly, wiping her face and scooting herself away from Daryl. Wouldn’t look him in the eye.

She stood, shaking like a leaf, but held her hand out to keep him away.

He watched her watch the ground for a couple seconds, poising to pounce forward to catch her when she fell.

She didn’t though, just stood there, borderline hyperventilating, as she stared downward with wide, scared eyes, as a scarlet stain spread between her legs.

“…Come on. Come here.”

He made a step towards her, but she took a step back.

He sighed quakingly, his heart pounding, his mind racing. What was he going to do?! Something was seriously, tremendously wrong, and he _couldn’t do anything._ He was useless. She was going to die in the middle of nowhere, with everyone she loved scattered.

He couldn’t help her. He couldn’t save her.

But Sasha or Maggie might. Carol almost certainly could.

_She’s not there._

He held out his hand again. “Let… Let me help you. Sasha, your sister, if we can find them, they can help you.”

Her eyes were feral, struck deep with the panic he had seen on animals that had become dinner. Her eyes were swollen and bloodshot with tears, cerulean reflecting back at him in terrifying reminiscence.

**_Bloodshot eyes. Blue too blue._ **

He tried to maintain eye contact.

The walkers would smell the blood. They would follow. They had to keep moving if they were going to make it out of this.

He made a move towards her, and she didn’t move away this time. He pulled his weapons from the ground, slung her arm over his shoulder, and started walking again.

She leaned heavily on him, and despite her small frame, Daryl felt it. His body ached over the three weapons and her.

“We’re almost there,” he whispered into her sticky hair. “We’re almost to Jude. Just hang in there.”

**oOo**

It seemed three or four times an hour she would have another one of those horrifying attacks, and he would have to try and lower her to the ground as she went through it.

It made him sick to see her like that. Sick with guilt and grief.

And they were happening more often.

The stain had spread down to her knees. He knew that the blood loss was dangerous, knew she needed water, medicine of some sort, probably a doctor.

He knew he had to catch up to them. Catch up very, very fast.

They were so close. That smoke pillar from God was leading them like the Israelites in the wilderness, and he only prayed that it didn’t go out.

Thus far, it hadn’t.

The track had widened out so that there was hardly a foothill to either side of them. Every corner he turned he clenched up, preparing himself for brown skin and kinky black hair, silky brown hair and bright green eyes.

Each corner had been a disappointment.

On the third, he heard the baby.

Beth had just conquered another attack, and Daryl was more dragging her than helping her, but at that sound, her eyes flew open, tears of joy beading there. She broke away from him as he reached towards her, trying to keep her from running, but nothing could keep her back.

“Jude! Judy-Ju!” she called out brokenly, voice cracking and rising and falling strangely. She laughed, more of a papery gasp.

She stumbled ahead, barely able to walk, running like an arthritic cripple towards the next bend.

“Stop! Beth, wait,” he bellowed, steeling himself for whomever was waiting, whomever was holding Judith.

He heard gasps and gleeful cries. “Beth! It’s Beth!”a young girl cried out.

He rounded the corner, Maggie’s name on his lips.

And then he saw, and he stumbled, knees buckling at the sight. Dropped all three weapons. Almost dropped himself.

His eyes burned, his nose tickled. A lump formed in his throat, choking him as he gasped like a fish, the wind knocked right out of him.

“Daryl!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Reviews are love!!


	7. Chapter 7

She surged towards him, arms out, a quivering grin on her lips. Her eyes were clear, blue, dripping tears.

She engulfed him.

She wrapped her arms around his shoulders, hands threading into his hair. He buried his face in her neck, arms clutching her sides, barely breathing. Barely holding it together.

He could feel her ribs through her leather jacket; he could smell the blood and formula on her body. She smelled alive, she felt alive, she _was_ alive.

He’d been right.

“I never thought I’d see you again,” he croaked, tears making a puddle of moisture between her shoulder and neck. He knew he should feel mortified that actual tears were leaking from his eyes, but he couldn’t. Couldn’t make himself feel anything but this _relief,_ this breath of air, like he had never breathed before now, and here he was finally feeling it, finally understanding.

Carol clutched him closer, leaned into him and sighed. “I didn’t. I knew you’d find me again.”

He laughed a little at that, his lips brushing her collar bone, and, oh, his heart hurt, but it was good, this was so good, and he wasn’t even angry at the moment, the resentment towards Rick fading like a fog as he held her, her breathing, warm body. _Alive. Alive. Alive._

She pulled his face up to mirror her own, and he brought his rough, coarse hands to hers as well, brushing aside the little downy hairs at the top of her hairline, taking in her freckles, her smile, her eyes.

She leaned her forehead against his and closed her eyes, and Daryl brought his hands up to her hair, holding her, feeling her breath on his face, warm as it dried his damp cheeks.

They would have stayed like that forever, a statue, but his eyes flitted away from her face, and he saw Beth on her knees, Judith in her lap, crying and rocking the little girl.

He looked back at her, and the spell was broken.

“Carol,” he started, letting the panic in his voice get her attention as he mourned the moment her joy would morph to fear. Her eyes snapped open, and she moved her head back a little to see him better.

“That’s Beth’s blood. That’s her blood,” he whispered quickly to her, brow furrowed as he tried to get across his meaning.

Carol’s eyes widened and she turned on her heel, her hand instinctively going up to her stomach, like he knew it did when something horrible was happening. She had seen the stain. She must have just thought it was from a walker, like most blood stains these days.

“Tyreese,” she called calmly, looking towards the big man who was smiling down at Beth and Judith, Mika and Lizzie by his side. He glanced up at her, and his face fell at her expression. She motioned for him to approach, and so he did.

“I need you to go get some more water from the river,” she said under her breath, an air of authority lacing its way into her timbre. “Beth’s sick, something’s wrong, and she needs clean water.”

Tyreese nodded quickly, worry on his face. “Sure thing. Do you want me to go ahead and take a peek at that camp, see if there’s anything we can use?”

Carol hesitated, and Daryl wondered haltingly what camp they were talking about. Not an inhabited one, he was sure. Was there an abandoned one he didn’t know about, that he had missed on the way here?

She shook her head. “…No. I don’t know if we have the time. But I want you to bring Mika with you. I don’t… I don’t want her seeing Beth like this. She’s too little.”

Tyreese nodded knowingly, and turned back to the girls. He called to Mika, and after a second of picking up their two pots, they left.

Carol watched them leave, and when their footsteps had gotten too far away to hear, she reached behind her to take Daryl’s hand, and led him towards Beth.

Her hand felt small and strong in his own, just like it always had.

“Lizzie,” Carol said commandingly. The girl’s eyes flew up to meet Carol’s, her hand slowly resting on her knife.

“Can you go walk the perimeter, sweetie? Just make sure nothing gets close,” she said again, and he could feel the forced compassion in her voice, the way her tone went from demanding and solid to soft and requesting in a couple seconds.

Something wasn’t right here, either.

Lizzie nodded, sparing a glance that was almost reminiscent of a glare at the baby, and then she walked away.

Carol watched her with something strange in her eyes, something between fear and worry and guilt, and Daryl didn’t know what was happening here, didn’t know what _had_ happened, and he wasn’t sure if he wanted to.

Carol blinked, then crouched in front of Beth, touched her face. “Sweetheart? Beth?”

Beth looked up at her with tired, swollen eyes, her death grip on Judith loosening only slightly.

Carol held her hands out for the baby, and waited patiently until the girl’s arms loosened from around her. She took her, and held her up to Daryl. He took Judith easily, and she immediately laid her head on his chest, sucking on her fingers as her eyes strained to stay open.

Carol stayed crouched beside Beth, and gave a brief look to Daryl.

He got the hint. He took Judith, lightly bouncing her, and went and retrieved his weapons, way out of ear shot of the murmuring women, hoping that his trained ears could turn themselves off for a couple of minutes, for everyone’s sake.

When he came back, he made to pass them right by, bring the guns and crossbow over to the fire, and to settle down while Carol fixed whatever was wrong with Beth.

But her hand shot out as he passed, barring his way. She looked up at him sadly, tension in her grip as her jaw set. “I need some things out of my backpack, and Judith’s diaper bag. Can you stay with her while I go?”

Daryl shifted uncomfortably, his single free arm loaded down, but he nodded hesitantly, knowing she wouldn’t ask him if it weren’t important. Not really wanting to leave Beth alone, himself, either, even for just a second.

 She smiled weakly and thanked him, then got up to go find her things.

He didn’t know if he should say something, murmur some words of comfort or encouragement. Like he had been trying so hard to do the past two days, like she had for him that first night.

Beth still sat, but now her knees were pulled up to her chest. Her face was rested there, and he could tell by the way she breathed and the tremors that were lacing their way up and down her form that she was hurting again.

A wave of guilt surged inside him. He didn’t know what to do. He didn’t know how to help her. At all. He was useless.

He stood there, awkwardly bouncing Judith, trying to think of something – _anything_ – to say to her.

Carol returned with a double armful of supplies before he could, a sleeping bag tucked under one arm. He made to move off, but she looked at him quickly.

“I need you to help me, Daryl,” she whispered, her eyes pleading.

He swallowed hard, wanting to be supportive, but also feeling so out of place, so awkward and uncomfortable with this whole situation. Didn’t she see that? Couldn’t she understand?

But who else was there to help?

 “Why don’t I give Jude to Lizzie, and she can help why I keep watch?”

Her face grew cold, and he knew instantly he had made a mistake there. She shook her head fiercely, rolling out the sleeping bag as she went with a snap. She turned and stood, taking his face in her hands, leaning close to his ear.

“ _Do not,_ under any circumstances, _ever,_ let Lizzie hold Judith. Don’t leave her alone with her. Don’t turn your back on her. Do not let her near the baby,” she whisper yelled in his ear, her breath harsh.

He was thoroughly confused, and terrified, but she wouldn’t need to tell him twice. What was so wrong with Lizzie that she was never allowed to even be alone with the baby? She couldn’t be older than Carl, so 13, 14 at most? What could be so fiercely wrong with a little girl in her early teens?

And then he remembered how Carl had been that hard winter after the farm, after Sophia. How it had only gotten worse after Lori was gone

And so he nodded quickly, didn’t question it.

She watched him for a second, as if making sure he had really heard her, had gotten her underlying meaning.

Oh, he had gotten it alright.

She helped Beth over to the sleeping bag, helped her lay down on her back. She reached into her pile and pulled out a Ziploc baggie of suspicious looking leaves.

She popped it open. “I found a car that couple of hippies had been living in. Enough medicinal herbs to give Marley a heart attack,” she said wryly, pulling out a single leaf and leaning forward. Beth cracked a little smile, and opened her mouth.

“It’s called arnica,” she explained smoothly, closing the bag and setting it to the side. “It’ll help with your pain. Suck on it until you can’t taste it anymore, and then chew it up and swallow it.” Beth nodded, and her face puckered up.

Carol went to work on her boots, pulling them off one by one, and then her socks, and then she moved to her belt.

Daryl turned around quickly, his face burning. He was so uncomfortable, he felt like he might fall out right there. What could he do? What could he help?

He started making a small loop around them, keeping his head up, his eyes out, making sure not to look at the girl that lay behind him with nothing on her legs but the blood that was escaping too fast.

“I can’t tell anything,” he heard Carol say softly. He heard her rummaging around, and then the angry squirt of an almost empty bottle of something or other. “I’m going to have to examine you.”

Beth made no noise, but his ears turned scarlet.

Back before they found the prison, with Lori big and pregnant, they were always having scares. They would haul ass out of Wal-Mart, and Lori would start having cramps, or some other crap that he wasn’t privy to, and the whole caravan would stop while Hershel examined her, thumped on her belly, listened with his stethoscope for a heartbeat, and when it was clear they weren’t in any real danger, they could carry on.

He kept his back turned for a couple seconds, but he heard Carol sigh deeply, so he knew something wasn’t good.

“How far along are you?” she said point-blank.

He whipped around reflexively, mouth hanging open in shock. Carol had thrown a towel over Beth’s lower extremities, thankfully, but neither of them were paying attention to him anyway.

She was staring at the older woman with wide eyes, chin quivering.

Beth wasn’t pregnant. Beth couldn’t be pregnant. Beth was just a little girl, there was no way-

“I didn’t know,” she choked out, voice high and quiet at the same time. She stole a glance at Daryl from the corner of her eye, and he turned his head away instinctively, knowing he shouldn’t be hearing this, that what was going to come out of her mouth was not meant for him.

“I thought… I don’t know.” She breathed deep, and started that almost hyperventilating again, groaning and bringing her hands up to her face.

Carol leaned forward and stroked her face, hushing her, doing so much better at comforting her in these few minutes than he had done the entire time. “I know sweetie, I know. Just try and calm down. Try not to be too loud.”

Beth nodded, her face under her hands, and then drew in three big breaths, one after the other. Her hands fell to her belly, then, and she stared up at the sky, tears streaming down her face. “I should have told him,” she whispered. “I didn’t know for sure, but I should have told him.”

Daryl wondered if she was talking about Zach or Hershel. And the fact that both were gone, that both of those strongholds in her life were dead, made him feel so empty, lost, that he had to hold Judith closer, let her scent waft over him, feel her little body in his arms to remind him that this was here, this was now, he and Judith and these people with him now were alive.

And Zach and Hershel were not. They were dead, but that also meant they were free.

Yet still the guilt raged, a tempest in his gut, trailing self-loathing in its wake. Zach was his charge. He had watched him die.

He had watched Hershel die, too.

Carol reached forward and took her hand. “You have to think sweetheart. When did you and Zach get together?”

Beth managed a shaky smile, and reached up to wipe the tears that were continuously streaming from her face.

“Maybe a month. Month and a half.”

Carol visibly relaxed, and stroked her hand softly.

“This will be easy then. You’re not too far along, so the…the embryo…it’s small,” she stumbled quickly. The baby. The dead baby that was in her womb was small.

Judith cooed then, and it was the worst time and the best time, but still he was silent. Could feel the emotional pain rolling off of the young girl on the ground

“I didn’t mean to lose it,” Beth sobbed, then, suddenly, the choking cry escaping from her throat violently. “I didn’t want to. I wanted to have it. I didn’t… I didn’t wish this…”

Carol leaned forward, took the girl in her arms, hushing her softly, murmuring small nothings that Daryl couldn’t hear.

Beth cried and cried.


	8. Chapter 8

Tyreese and Mika returned not long after that, full sloshing pots in tow. They were laughing together over a story Ty was telling in explicit detail, not caring about the world and what was so very wrong with it.

Daryl’s heart hurt when he saw that moment of change in their eyes, the second Mika’s baby faced giggles morphed into shock and terror, when Tyreese’s face fell, concern between his eyes.

He shot Daryl a questioning look, glancing at Beth and Carol, still curled into a half-embrace on the ground, and then back at him. Daryl only shook his head, his eyes flitting to his boots, lightly covering the little ear that wasn’t resting against his sternum.

“Carol?” Mika stuttered out, her voice high and shaky.

Beth stopped her crying with a hiccup, and leaned forward, plastering a smile on her blotchy face. Carol straightened, her eyes warming with a grin.

“Oh, good,” she said lightly, her eyes crinkling at the corners. “Come here honey, bring that pot with you. That’s just what we needed.”

Mika’s mood immediately shifted with Carol’s. She smiled and hopped forwards, the tall stainless steel pot splashing water down the front of her dirt stained t-shirt. She looked down at herself and murmured an “oops”, giggling quietly. Carol kept smiling at her.

“Thank you, honey. Now you stand and hold this towel up in front of Bethie so I can help her get all cleaned up, alright?”

Mika nodded dutifully, setting the pot down and reaching towards the towel that Carol was lifting off of Beth.

Daryl turned quickly, and made towards the little campfire. The sun was setting lazily, casting a warm, dreamlike quality over their little camp. Tyreese was busying himself with building the fire up below the little grate that the pot sat on. Lizzie stood behind him, half-turned, her knife out as she watched him from the corners of her eyes.

His grip on Judith tightened instinctively.

The child stirred against him, eyes blearily opening. She let out a little whine as she fisted her hands in those small, blue eyes, bottom lip tremoring precariously as she looked up and around. She saw Daryl and her expression calmed for a moment, and then soured again. She let out a bleating cry, pushing against him, bringing her hand back to her mouth.

He started bouncing her quickly, but when that proved inadequate, looked to Tyreese.

“Any formula left?”  He asked loudly over the din of her cries, trying to be heard but trying not to upset her further.

Tyreese nodded tiredly, and motioned towards the diaper bag. “Got a whole can,” he breathed, blowing on the fire to try and get it going. “Only got one bottled water left though, and until this boils, that’s all we got. So use sparingly.”

Daryl nodded, and tried again to bounce her into silence. He half galloped over to the diaper bag, trying unsuccessfully to unzip it and make the bottle with the screaming girl in his arms.

He glanced over at Lizzie, made sure she was a fair distance away, and then stripped off his leather vest, laid it on the ground, and laid her on it.

She kept right on screaming, but at least now he had two hands to try and figure this out.

He sighed with relief at the image of three clean bottles, each having measured scoops of formula inside. He hurriedly fixed the bottle, and in record time, whirled around and shoved it into her squealing little mouth.

She made a squeak of surprise as the nipple hit her tongue, seeming very confused at the sudden sensation, but began sucking with such gusto he almost dropped the bottle. He laughed at her, and she ignored him, going to town on what he was assuming was her only source of nutrients since they had left the prison. There were no little mason jars of pureed carrots in there, and he knew how fast they went through pureed carrots. He was usually the one meticulously placing each and every glass jar into the buggy. What idiot had come up with the great idea of glass baby food jars, anyway?

The girl was probably starving.

He picked her and the vest up in one armful and cradled her against him with the bottle in one hand and her in the other. He settled down against a pine tree at the base of the forest line, glancing up quickly at the suddenly silenced campsite, trying in vain to calm the jitters that had wormed their way into his flesh, leaving his skin crawling. His sixth sense was screaming at him, as it usually did when things calmed down too fast, but he knew that it was likely just residual stress. That everything was fine.

Tyreese was now unpacking empty water bottles and canteens and setting them by the fire. Lizzie was staring at him in a way that was not making him feel any better, and Mika was dragging the sleeping bag over towards the fire. Carol was helping Beth hobble over closer to the rest of them. She was wearing new pants, but from where they came from, he had no idea.

Carol had always had a knack for that, having exactly what you needed. The woman squirreled away anything useful, and when someone’s shoelace ripped, or their pants snagged a hole in a very undignified place, or a sweater was stolen by a couple walkers in a pinch, Carol was always there with a replacement. Didn’t matter your size or gender, she always had something to give you.

She helped her settle down again, then took one of the empty water bottles and filled it with the simmering water. She took it back to Beth, who thanked her and laid down, her back to the rest of them.

Tyreese was eyeing her anxiously, and seemed to be on the verge of asking, when Carol returned, a small, sad smile on her lips, and shook her head slowly, as if to say _I know what you’re thinking, but she’s going to live, so you’re not finding out now while it could still upset her._

He seemed to get the point, and instead amended the question.

“So how did y’all find us? Did you… Did you see anyone else get out?” he asked quickly.

Daryl knew what he was really asking.

He shook his head slowly, shifting the bottle up higher to keep the air at the top.

“I didn’t see Sasha,” he intoned softly. “All I saw was the bus leavin’, and Rick and the Governor goin’ at each other.”

And the Governor hacking at Hershel’s neck as he died. He had seen that, too.

But he didn’t add that, not with Beth so distressed just a couple yards away. And surely not in front of Carol, who wasn’t even there to know the horrors of what they saw.

“We were headed for one of the evac houses when I saw your tracks. Beth saw one of Judith’s diapers, and so we kept on goin’ til we found you.”

He popped the empty bottle out of Judy’s mouth and propped her up against his shoulder to burp her.

Tyreese just gawked at him.

His eyebrows lowered. “What?” he quipped gruffly as he patted gently against the baby’s back.

Tyreese just shook his head, a throaty laugh rumbling from his core. “If you only knew what I went through trying to get the kid to _shut up_ on the way out of the prison… Screamed her head off the whole night, drew every walker from a mile round on our trails.” He shook his head again and motioned a finger towards them.

“You got her to sleep in less than a minute, and then you knew exactly what was wrong with her. Man, you should’ve been the one with the kids,” he said.

 _No, I shouldn’t have,_ he thought to himself, shame blanketing his thoughts as he remembered that first night.

He shook off the bad thoughts, busying himself with Rick’s baby.

“Pfft,” he answered in his usual way, wanting to hide his face as Judith burped loudly, jerking at her own sound and then twisting to turn back around and see everyone else.

“See?! I never even knew you had to do that!” Tyreese laughed out.

Carol settled down with her pack and started putting her various items away methodically, a big smile playing on her face. She knew how uncomfortable praise made him. And she was wallowing in it.

“Daryl has always had a way with that baby,” Carol said matter-of-factly, not even looking up as she unzipped pocket after pocket.

Daryl felt his face burning, but didn’t say anything. Just held the girl in his lap as she reached towards the rocks on the ground, giggling in that beautiful baby way as she tested each color, each size, each texture.

It became a rhythm of pushing her hands away from her mouth; warding away the dirty and occasionally blood-splattered rocks that little Judith wanted so desperately to taste and gnaw on.

Everywhere was a grave. Everywhere.

The sun was dipping low, and visibility was getting bad. When the pot had boiled for a sufficient amount of time, Carol pulled it off to let it cool, and set the other on the grate.

Why would Carol have pots with her? He knew Tyreese wouldn’t have taken them. He barely got the girls out.

He tried to catch her eye to ask her quietly, but she was too caught up in filling the water bottles and canteens, distributing them to the backpack and the diaper bag.

He cleared his throat, and her head immediately shot up.

He nodded towards the pots. “What you doing hitchhiking with gumbo pots?”

Carol chuckled at him. “I wasn’t hitchhiking,” she said vaguely, a small smile on her face. “I told you I found a hippie’s car. I found a couple suitcases filled with clothes, a couple pots, some other supplies. Lots of drugs. I was driving…away from the prison… when I heard screaming.”

“She saved us,” Mika piped in, smiling shyly. “Me and Lizzie and Judith were surrounded, and she killed them all.”

A shadow passed over Carol’s face, but it quickly passed and she gave her a motherly, you-know-better, look. “There weren’t _that_ many.”

“Yeah huh!” Mika argued. “There were, like, at least six. And you didn’t even use your gun! At least, not to kill them…”

It was Carol’s turn to blush. She just shook her head, smiling to herself. “No, I didn’t. Should’ve, though. Would have been much smarter.” She looked pointedly at Lizzie, whose back was turned and stiff, as if she were purposely trying to be as little involved as she could manage.

Daryl wasn’t sure he wanted to know the details.

“But I rescued the wrong people,” Carol said softly, continuing on her story. “Mika wasn’t screaming, she knew better. Tyreese had gone to help some people who had been ambushed by several walkers. We headed towards them, and they were all dead except for one. He was bitten, so it wouldn’t have been long for him. He told us to keep to the tracks to the west, to stay out of the woods. They didn’t even know they had been travelling towards the tracks.”

Daryl nodded, putting it together.

“So you went back to get your stuff.”

Carol nodded. She put the last baggie of herbs in an outside pocket and turned her head over her shoulder.

“You doing alright, Beth?” she questioned, her face a mask of duty and concern. She mumbled an affirmative.

“…So why did you stop here?” he asked, quickly unraveling Judith’s soft palm from a discarded bottle cap she had discovered. She protested lightly, but he hushed her, placing a smooth pebble in her hand, and she started babbling again.

Carol shrugged. “The girls needed to rest. So did we.”

He waited.

“…and it doesn’t really sit well with me.”

He looked at her, willing her to explain herself without him having to ask.

It worked. She glanced up at him, and her eyes narrowed into a squint. She swatted a mosquito away from her face and sighed.

“The map. To that Terminus, Sanctuary place? The only way to get there is by the tracks. Which means the only way to get there is on foot, completely vulnerable. It doesn’t sit well with me. The sign made it seem like they were eager for inhabitants, but it’s been a long day, and we’re not even close. Why aren’t there tents, packs of water, backpacks of supplies along the way? It just doesn’t make sense.”

Daryl’s eyes had gotten considerably wider as she spoke, and by the end, he was practically kicking himself. This was insane. She was one hundred percent, without a doubt, right. This just screamed Woodbury.

He could tell Tyreese felt the same way. His eyes were big and downcast as he shook his head at the ground, poking absentmindedly at the fire. “We can’t keep going then,” he answered, looking up from under his eyebrows. “We can’t risk it.”

Carol shook her head. Daryl nodded.

“I guess we make our way back to one of the safe houses, then?” he offered, watching Carol closely as he did. Something –fear, anger, anxiety- flashed in her eyes, but she nodded slowly. She looked back at Lizzie, who was still patrolling, with Mika now by her side, and her face took on an expression of such anguish that he had to stop himself from reaching out to her.

There was a heavy silence that fell.

Tyreese broke it as the sky began to lose its yellow hues. He swallowed deeply. “Is someone going to tell me what’s wrong with Beth?”

Daryl focused intently on the ground and tried not to look up, willed Carol to answer him.

She did.

“She’s having a miscarriage. I think it was probably the stress of losing the prison, getting separated from her family. Could have been over-exertion. Or really anything at all,” she breathed, wiping her brow and sparing a look behind her. “She’s a tough girl, though. She’ll make it through.”

Tyreese blanched, but tried to cover it quickly with a couple nods. “I should have known. Back at our first camp, there was a woman, she was pretty far along.” He took a deep breath. “Walker got her husband, and she was so upset she miscarried. That was before we knew that, well, you didn’t have to be bit to turn. She held that tiny little thing all day and all night. Sasha and some other old lady finally got her to let them bury it.”

Carol was watching him closely, processing his words. “So… It didn’t turn.”

Tyreese shook his head. “Plenty of time to, too. Guess whatever it is that makes you come back, you don’t get it until you breathe it in.”

Carol seemed to relax at that, and leaned back on her palms, legs crossed. She sat back and watched Beth’s tiny form, seemingly lost in her own thoughts. “I was worried about that. Thank you.”

He nodded slowly. “Poor girl’s been through enough. At least she don’t have to go through that, too.”

Carol and Daryl both nodded, looking to the living baby in his lap that they had almost lost so many times, the baby that never should have even existed, and yet here she was. Mother taken by this world. Shane dead before her birth, Rick disappeared, unlikely to be either alive or ever found.

And yet she wasn’t motherless, like Beth. And if he had anything to do with it, Rick or no Rick, she wouldn’t be fatherless like Beth, either.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Drop me a line if you feel up to it!!


	9. Chapter 9

Carol took the first watch that night.  
  
He tried to argue with her, but Beth very rudely pointed out that he had slept maybe fifteen minutes in the past two days, and so he was shot down.  
  
He sent her as pointed a look as he could bear to give the battered girl, and she answered with a roll of her baby blues and a glare.  
  
"I'm not an idiot. I knew you were faking."  
  
The lines on her forehead made him feel more guilt than annoyance.  
  
Carol gave him a look from her place at the fire, one he was more than well-versed in. He had seen it more times in the past year and a half than he could count; anytime he had slipped the better half of his portion onto Lori’s plate while no one else was looking, when he took a double watch so that Rick could spend more time with his daughter, the times he had sacrificed a coveted chocolate bar to a sullen Carl.

He could still hear her mantra echoing in his memories.

 ** _You need to take better care of yourself. You’re important to us, to me._**   
  
But it still sent a wave of nausea in his gut, the way she looked at him. The way she saw straight through him, always had.  
  
And he knew her, too. Could understand her more than he thought anyone else did. It wasn’t that.

He couldn’t hide from her. Not anything, really. He could try, but he knew she would always figure him out.

And that terrified him, that there was someone, _one person in this world_ , that he couldn’t hide from. He’d never had that, had always been able to tamp down his grief and fear and replace it with anger, violence. He could always been able to keep those soft emotions in check, the feelings that would earn him scars.

It was all he was, before the quarry. At the quarry. Angry and violent, mean.   
  
It was her that had started to draw him towards the light, take him back. She saw him better than he saw himself, he knew that, and she helped him discover the virtues his mother had given him, that he had suppressed in his need to survive. Things he knew he should have held on to. Courtesy. Compassion. Care for your fellow man.

And she saw that, long before he did.  
  
He was terrified of what she saw that he hadn't found yet.  
  
He knew he could be selfless now, occasionally. She told him so. She told him he was honorable, had a sense of duty.  
  
But there were other things. Other things she would figure out.  
  
How he had almost given up that first night. How he had lost himself in his grief momentarily.

How he had actually considered killing Beth.

How he was a _coward_. How he had run and hid from his father all those years, how he had tasted the dust bunnies beneath his bed while his mother and Merle tasted blood. He had no courage. He had let them be beaten within an inch of their lives, and all he had done to help them was pray.  
  
He had prayed and prayed for God to save his mother, his brother, him.  
  
And God had taken his mother in return. And his brother, now. And probably his father.  
  
Maybe, in some way, God had answered his prayers.  
  
But there were other things. Other things he couldn't think of at this moment, but that he was sure were there, lurking beneath the surface, ready to strangle the good in her, choke it and kill it and suck all the life out until she was just a husk again, a shadow of a woman who was terrified to speak.  
  
It wasn't okay. It didn't feel right, her knowing him. He couldn't let his demons, his evil, taint her.  
  
It wasn't okay.

 **oOo**  
  
The girls insisted on sleeping on either side of Beth. She’d wanted to have Judith beside her, too, but Carol put her foot down there. She said that Judith would keep her up, and she needed to sleep.  
  
And since Carol had first watch, and Tyreese was barely adequate, it was him who bounced her and rocked her until she went to sleep.  
  
All six of them squeezed onto that unzipped sleeping bag, Daryl and Mika on the edges, with Beth, Lizzie, Tyreese and Judith in-between.  
  
Carol situated everyone before she took her place on the other side of the little fire. He didn't miss the way she switched Mika and Lizzie so that Lizzie was in-between two people, away from the baby. She wanted to make sure that it was as difficult as possible for her to get up unknown to the others.  
  
And the way she put Tyreese between Judith and her, so that there was an obstacle.  
  
Every action of Carol's was deliberate, thought out, strong.  
  
He settled uncomfortably close to the edge, the baby between him and Tyreese. He had wrapped her back up in his vest as night had fallen and Carol informed him that there were no blankets for her.  
  
Which meant he was freezing his butt off.  
  
The little fire was doing little against the night breeze.  
  
He didn't really want to sleep, anyway.  
  
His body ached, his eyes felt dry and sucked of all life. He knew he needed to rest. But he wasn't going to. He wasn't.  
  
He wasn't going to think of how he had let Beth be deprived of the father to her baby. The grandfather to her baby. He wasn't going to dwell on how she shuddered, even in her sleep, or how her mouth let out little mewls of fear and sorrow and pain from her dreams.

Just a little girl. Just a girl.  
  
He wouldn't think about how Carol's ribs were prominent, even under her jacket, how her spine poked through her skin when she bent. He would not allow himself to look at Judith's dirty face and think of how she wouldn't have a proper bath with her duckie and that sweet smelling baby soap in who knows how long.  
  
He wouldn't think about it. And he sure as hell wouldn't dream about it.  
  
But Carol was watching him. He knew she was. He could feel those eyes boring holes into the back of his stained button-up. He knew he had to relax his muscles to trick her, start breathing easier. Stop jumping at every crackle from the fire and actually settle down.  
  
Easier said than done.  
  
He eventually lulled himself into a twilight sleep, not really under but not really awake, either. It was dreamless, but he was still aware of Beth's soft sounds, the snaps of wood in the fire, Judith's quick baby breathing.  
  
It wasn't until Tyreese got up to relieve Carol that he roused himself fully.  
  
He watched her as she settled down in his place, only to lean up on one elbow and reach forward to the little girl.  
  
He felt himself reach towards her, aggravation mounting in his gut as Judith began to protest, not fully awake yet, but soon to be. Carol ignored his hand and hushed the girl softly as she flipped her over on her back and covered her again with the vest.  
  
Judith quieted quickly, her hand making its way into her mouth above the leather, her eyebrows drawn in unhappily in sleep.  
  
Carol leaned back down and ran a single finger over her forehead, tracing the shiny auburn bangs down to her nose, sighing slowly.  
  
"She's not a year old yet," she whispered softly, her eyes fluttering closed for a couple seconds, then opening lazily to look at him.  
  
He felt his heart rate increase slowly, a rising drumbeat, as she stared him in the eyes, switching between them, flicking at his lips.  
  
He swallowed. Felt his mouth go dry.  
  
Carol's gaze shifted back to the baby quickly, as if she could sense his slight fear and unease. "If it's ever just you, don't let her sleep on her belly," she said quickly, all business. "Don't smoke around her, either. They're SIDS risk factors."  
  
He shook his head at her, confused. Him alone with Judith? Why would he ever be alone with Judith?  
  
Well. Why would he have ever been alone with Beth?  
  
He didn't argue her down, but sent a questioning, tired look her way. When she didn’t answer at first, he sighed. Closed his eyes for a couple seconds, relishing the feeling of rest, and then opened them again to look at her.  
  
She sighed. "Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. She could just die in her sleep, and there would be nothing you could do about it."  
  
He felt a cold black hole open in his stomach, swallowing all warmth and what little security he had felt a second ago. He found himself immediately counting Judith's breaths to himself, watching for her little chest to rise and fall in a rhythm.  
  
"You forget," he mumbled. "That there're any...any other dangers." She offered a small half-smile and glanced back up at him.  
  
He lowered his head onto his folded arms and breathed deep, images of undead babies flying circles in his thoughts. He blinked several times, tried to evict the little horrors from their nest in the back of his mind.  
  
He closed his eyes and turned his face to the ground, tried to keep his breathing under control.  
  
He felt a soft hand on his back and he immediately flinched at the contact, the sensation of someone touching him kindly there alien and frightening.  
  
She didn't move though, kept rubbing small circles along his spine and humming lightly. He felt ashamed at flinching. It felt...different, but almost comforting to have her touch him.  
  
His shirt was thin, though. He knew she could feel the ropy scars beneath it, where his flesh had puckered and healed poorly. He felt her trace them as her fingers followed their pattern, curling back into circles at the last second.  
  
He felt himself relax. It was okay. She had seen them before. It was okay.  
  
It was okay. This was okay.


	10. Chapter 10

He awoke at dawn to Judith’s muffled mewls of hunger. Her face was covered by the vest, and he had such a jolt of panic at her breathlessness  that he didn’t even notice the way Carol’s arm still rested on his back, the way his arm rested against her other hand across the baby, fingers winding softly in with hers.

He ripped the vest off of Judith, but that just seemed to scare her more. She started really crying then, not just whining, and he groaned to himself at the recognition that this was it, no more sleep for today.

He scooped her up and held her against him.

“Ssh, ssh, baby girl. ‘Ts alright. ‘Ts okay.” He whispered as he clumsily stood, grunting as his joints popped and creaked.

He was too old to have a kid. This baby was Rick’s actions, not his.

Or Shane’s.

Kid sure did have a rage like him, that was for sure.

He hobbled over to the diaper bag and fixed her bottle as he blinked the sleep from his eyes. He shifted her to the crook in his arm and plugged her screeching maw just as she began kicking him with those powerful little feet.

The silence was heavenly.

He sighed deep, felt every inch of him relax. He glanced over at Tyreese, who just shook his head at him, a look of complete disgust on his face.

“That just ain’t right, man.”

Daryl scoffed and settled down beside him, crossing his legs at the ankles. He stared up at the peachy sky, tasted the morning dew, almost smiled to himself.

Today could be good. It could be. They could start to one of the safe houses, maybe get close. He could probably steal a half hour or so to get some game for the rest of them, actually be of some worth. They could all make it to another night.

Another night.

He hadn’t dreamt last night.

The thought hit him like a ton of bricks. He hadn’t dreamt of anything last night. He had actually slept peacefully.

He eyed Carol where she slept on the sleeping bag. Lizzie had thrown an arm over her shoulder, and she was sleeping deep. A small smile played on her lips, and he could almost see the dream she was having, of another blonde little girl, sleeping beside her with her arms wrapped around her.

He couldn’t wake her from that.

“You can go on and rest,” he murmured as he tapped Judith lightly, trying to lull her back to sleep.

Tyreese clapped him on the shoulder in response and stood, swaying as he stumbled over to the other sleeping forms.

He slumped right up against Carol, his back to her. He saw her expression of contentment morph into something else, something darker. Her eyebrows were drawn in close, lines puckering her forehead.

Daryl tried to kill the snarl before it started in his throat, but he was only half successful.

Tyreese was too far gone though, already out. Carol’s face soured in her sleep as the big man breathed deep.

He wished he could wake her from that.

**oOo**

They started out not long afterwards. Beth had hobbled to her feet, and was making to head towards the woods when Daryl stopped her.

“Uh-uh,” he intoned gruffly. “You take Carol with you.”

She practically growled at him. He half expected her to flip him off.

Her face screwed up into a look so full of loathing that his heart almost skipped a beat, but he righted himself with slight triumph as she turned around and poked Carol.

Carol’s eyes flew open, hands going straight to Lizzie’s arms. They were wild, terrified, and his heart ached as he saw her slowly adjust to reality.

“I gotta pee, and Leader over there insists I take an escort,” she quipped, eyes narrowing and shooting arrows his way.

He smirked at her, and she rolled her eyes in return.

Carol sighed, exasperated, and took a big, deep breath before standing up quickly. She motioned for the younger girl to go ahead, then came back around near him.

“Uh,” he started, head going from Beth to her, and back again.

Now Carol rolled her eyes. “She needs a pad. Chill.”

His head dropped immediately. He knew his face must’ve been brighter than the do rag he carried around in his back pocket, felt the heat spread down his neck and over to his ears. He nodded, busying himself with straightening Judith’s already straight socks.

Carol chuckled a little. She hit him on the bare shoulder with something plastic and scented, and he jerked away in slight fear.

“Sorry, Pookie,” she called over her shoulder as she followed Beth into the woods.

Judith woke at her words, but not unhappily. She blinked up at Daryl blearily, a small smile spreading across her little mouth. He smiled at her and helped her sit up when she started to struggle.

A tell-tale squelch ensued that wrinkled his nose. He groaned, but he reached towards the diaper bag to get what he needed.

He had just about finished up when Carol and Beth returned. Carol set to getting the girls up, and passed around power bars. She slipped a baggie of something to Beth, who took it with a look of relief, and before long, they were off, Daryl with Judith, the diaper bag, and his bow, Tyreese with Beth’s rifle and Beth, Carol with her pack and his rifle, and the two girls each with a gumbo pot tucked under their arm.

They walked in relevant silence, going right back the way they came.

**OoO**

The rustling from the tree line grew. Carol stuck out her arms to either side, stopping the girls mid-giggle. They choked on their laugh, eyes widening, hands freezing.

Daryl held a hand against his lips and shifted the sleeping baby up high on his shoulder, praying she would stay asleep, stay silent.

The walker was getting closer. Its hisses were high pitched, its gait loud and clumsy. Carol looked to him as she drew her knife and motioned for him to stand back with her head.

 _Coward,_ his inner voice intoned.

But he had to let her. Beth was leaning on Tyreese. He couldn’t hand over Judy without waking her up.

He had to. He had to trust her.

He stepped back slowly, tapping Mika to follow him. She took his hand quickly, her little fingers so small in his, grabbing at her sister, and they followed him back towards the rail.

Carol approached the treeline as the walker approached her. The trees were a black portal that they were both meeting, and one of them would have to cross.

His heart was pounding, which was stupid, he knew. She had killed dozens of walkers. It was no different. She could do it again.

But then it happened.

Daryl saw that brown moptop, and he knew. He pushed the girls behind him as he heard Beth let loose an ungodly wail.

Mika started crying. Lizzie told her to shut up.

And Carol just stood there.

She just stood there.

Her knife had fallen to the ground.

She _just stood there._

He was close, so close, dangerously close, his bloody mouth open and raw, ready to take a meal that wasn’t his first.

“ _CAROL!”_ he bellowed.

Her head tilted up, but she was too slow, it was all too slow, they were mosquitoes caught in amber and everything was syrup.

Judith awoke, frightened to death, and he held her against him roughly as he hefted his loaded crossbow up in one arm.

One shot. One arm.

Zero time.

**OoO**

Luke fell in a heap, the arrow buried to the feathers in his curly brown hair.

Beth was moaning on the ground, grieving, Mika not far from her. Tyreese tried to hush them both gently, but this time it was too bad, too hard.

Lizzie looked at them scathingly and rolled her eyes. She looked up at Daryl, eyes flitting to the terrified baby that knew something bad had happened.

“You need to shut her up.”

It drew him out of his haze.

He surged towards her, discarding the crossbow in the gravel.

Carol stood in front of the dead little boy, her face frozen, her hands limp.

He took her into him, his heart pounding and sending adrenaline through his veins at lightspeed. He held her head against his shoulder with one arm.

“God, oh God,” he breathed, gasping for breath as he tried to get himself under control. His hands wove into her short hair, anchoring him against him. Judith’s cries had calmed to sad little hiccups.

_He almost lost her._

Carol didn’t cry.

“I… I couldn’t do it…” she said, detached. “I couldn’t. I couldn’t.”

He hushed her, kissed her temple absently.

Her taste lingered on his lips.

She stiffened against him.

His hands shook.

What had he done?

Why had he done that?

Things were going too fast, speeding up faster than he could keep up with. He felt like he could pass out, felt the blood pumping in his ears and reverberating in the veins against his skull.

He held her against him, tried to steer her back towards the rest of them. Mika was still sniffling, but Beth had swiped her face once again, letting her mask of determination fall back into place.

Tyreese eyed them stoically, and stood, leaving Mika in Beth’s arms on the ground. “Do you need that arrow?” he asked strongly, nodding towards the little boy.

Daryl shook his head vehemently, adjusted Judith against his shoulder. “Ain’t worth it. Leave it,” he growled.

Tyreese nodded, relief flowing across his form. He went to Beth and helped her up again, leaving Mika to scramble up on her own.

Carol let her arm fall from around Daryl. “I can walk, Daryl,” she said, her voice small. Weak. “I need to take care of my girls.”

He let her go, swallowed past the lump in his throat.

He went back to get his bow. He looked at Luke with tears threatening, and at the last second, made his decision.

He walked towards him with purpose and crouched beside him. He flipped him over gently, shut his eyes. Folded his arms and straightened his legs. Wiped the blood from his mouth with his rag.

And then he picked up Carol’s knife, and they left.


	11. Chapter 11

The girls didn't talk much after that.  
  
Neither did the boys, but they at least attempted conversation. Tyreese tried to draw them out, and was rejected one by one.  
  
Daryl, for his part, knew when to shut up. It was one of his few true talents, but knowing when it was better to stay silent was perhaps the most valued.  
  
Carol distanced herself from them, walked hand in hand with her girls. Mika sniffled occasionally, and whenever she did, Carol would bring a hand to the back of her hair, and lean down and plant a slow kiss on her forehead.  
  
Daryl didn't miss the way her eyes scrunched up, the way she bit her tongue and breathed deep. He'd seen her do it a million times, and he knew her routine. She was holding it together for them, always for them.  
  
Judith was getting fussier and fussier as the day went on. She was tired of being held, and squirmed and squealed almost endlessly. He found himself playing a game of acrobats with her; pushing her into his shoulders, against his breastbone, cradled in the crook of his arm, on his hip.  
  
It didn't matter. She was pissed off.  
  
He had searched that damn diaper bag for a pacifier more times than he could count.  
  
Lizzie kept staring at them, sending dirty looks at the baby and rolling her eyes. He found himself making faces right back at her in annoyance. Trying to cover the creeping sense of horror that rushed through his blood at her cold, mean eyes.  
  
It was about midday when her screeching seemed to become too much for Carol. The areas to the left and right of the tracks had leveled back up into hills, and the walkers were getting more frequent, hissing and pitching forward over the edge headfirst, where Carol usually waited, her steel-knuckled knife in hand.  
  
He felt a swell of pride every time she snarled, every time she drove that blade home. She was strong. And he had helped her find her strength.  
  
She sheathed her knife with a grunt, turning around quickly. She walked towards Daryl with an exasperated look on her face and reached towards the baby.  
  
He practically threw the kid at her.  
  
Judith didn't seem to mind. She kept right on wailing, gnawing on her fingers the whole time.  
  
Carol flipped her over into the crook of her arm and lifted her lips, looking closely and running her finger over the top of her mouth.  
  
Judith protested loudly, whipped her little fingers at Carol and screeched angrily.  
  
Carol sighed, turned again. She reached into the diaper bag on Daryl's arm and started rummaging around angrily, a twist in her mouth and lines in her forehead.  
  
Daryl took the child from her gently, and handed her the diaper bag.  
  
She sighed. "Thank you," she breathed, closing her eyes and taking a breath before looking again, this time patiently.  
  
She came back up with a tiny tube, smiling in her small way. She motioned for Judith, and Daryl gave her to her quickly, taking the bag back to swing over his shoulder.  
  
Carol unscrewed the tube quickly and rubbed its clear contents all over the inside of Judith's mouth, being kicked and screamed at the whole time.  
  
But by the time she capped the tube and put it back in the bag, Judith had quieted, and the day was silent again.  
  
There was a collective sigh of everyone in the group.  
  
Carol handed the baby back to him and smiled again. "Just teething," she sang, taking Mika and Lizzie's hands once again.  
  
 **oOo**  
  
There weren't many walkers after that.  
  
They walked until the little girls were tripping over their own feet in exhaustion, Tyreese practically carrying Beth himself.  
  
They slept for a few hours, Daryl on watch, and then they got up and started walking again.  
  
Beth didn't seem to be getting any better, but Carol wasn't too worried, so he squished his apprehension and focused himself on other things.  
  
Like Judith. His arms ached with the weight of her. He couldn't defend them at all with her in his arms, and since Tyreese had Beth on his shoulder, it was Carol who had to keep her eyes peeled, her hand on her hilt. He didn't like being so defenseless, exposed, but he didn't know what to do about it.  
  
It wasn't easy for Judith, either. Constantly being held in sticky arms was making her crankier and crankier.  
  
He was really tired of walking.  
  
But he thought, to an extent, he had it easy. All he had to do was watch out for her. He didn't have to worry about Beth falling and him having to protect her in an attack. He didn't have to worry about a scared little girl and her psycho sister.  
  
He just had a baby. That's all.  
  
But if it somehow wound up just being them two? If they got separated or...or...something else...  
  
He would have to think of something else. A sling, or something, to keep her on him but let his arms be free.  
  
They turned off the tracks on the second afternoon, and got to the safe house on the second night.  
  
They turned the corner on the vacant dirt driveway. Carol gave Lizzie a boost so she could hop over the wood fence and pop the latch, and then they were in.  
  
The sight was bittersweet. The Civic was there, with half a tank, which either meant that someone was here and hadn't left yet, or no one had made it to this evac point.  
  
The door was still locked, which was good. Daryl didn't remember where the key was, but Carol did, and thumbed along the underside of the porch swing for the taped key.  
  
When she found it, they knew. No one was here.  
  
Good and bad. Bad, that no one had made it here. It was probably where Luke had been coming for, so whoever was with him, had left with him, was either lost in the woods, or gone.  
  
Daryl's bet was on gone. You didn't just let a little boy turn. People didn't do that.

 _Their_ people didn’t do that.  
  
The house was stocked with a week's worth of food for four people, and another diaper bag and a car seat.  
  
Daryl immediately set Judith down on the floor and pulled his shoes off. They had chosen this house because it was a "green" house, with a well and a pump and solar panels. They had taken the solar panels for the prison and rigged them up to the bathrooms, but the water was still on, and working.  
  
And because it had been vacated before anyone could die here, so the house smelled like vinegar and dust, not blood and brains.  
  
Carol immediately set to work checking the house thoroughly, making sure that all the doors were still locked, shades still drawn, and that no one (or thing) had gotten in. When she had proved to herself that they were safe for the time being, she ushered the girls into a bathroom to shower, and took their clothes with her to the sink.  
  
Tyreese laid Beth down on one of the couches, and then laid down himself. He could hear their duel snoring almost immediately.  
  
Judith, for her part, was crawling all over the place, under the table, by the useless tv, staring up in awe at a sight she had never before seen.  
  
A house. Couches. Windows with curtains instead of bars.  
  
Carol finished with the girl's clothes and went into one of the back bedrooms for replacements.  
  
By the time she was done with them, every single one was moderately clean and had on new (if ill-fitting) clothes.  
  
Carol's clothes fit alright, as did Lizzie's, but Mika's were too big, Daryl's too big, and Tyreese's too small.  
  
It didn't matter. They were clean, and now they could eat and rest, and then head out in the morning.  
  
 **OoO**

They crashed in various places that night. Tyreese and Beth stayed where they had been, and Carol took Mika and Lizzie in the master bedroom with her.

Which left Daryl and Judith. Again.

He loved the kid, he did, but he needed a break. He really needed a break.

Not to mention, he wasn’t exactly sure how he felt about sleeping in a bed with her. There was nothing weird about it, he just…it was a baby. He wasn’t the kind of guy that snuggled up with babies and sung lullabies.

It was different, back out on the tracks. He didn’t have to think about it.

But what if he rolled onto her? What if she smothered herself on the pillows?

There was a black hole of anxiety rolling in his gut. He couldn’t leave her, because what if, by some freak accident, something got in?

What if Lizzie got out?

He just didn’t like it. He wasn’t capable of this, he just knew he wasn’t.

So when he felt a knock on the door, he almost cried with relief. Judith was sleeping peacefully (on her back) under the thin quilt.

Carol peeked her head in, looked past where Daryl sat at Judith on the bed. She smiled, her eyes crinkling up at the edges. She assessed the situation, and then padded into the room on socked feet. She crawled over him onto the bed and tucked herself into the covers beside Judith, who sighed in her sleep and started sucking fervently on her fingers.

Daryl gulped, his mind racing a little. What was she doing here? Where was he supposed to sleep now?

Maybe he could just conk out right here. He was tired enough.

He leaned his head back on the mattress, sighed and closed his eyes.

“Lizzie and Mika were kicking me,” Carol whispered.

He felt himself laugh more than he thought it was funny. She just made him so damn nervous, sometimes.

He didn’t know what to think, so he didn’t say anything.

There were a couple minutes of silence at that, so long that he was sure she had fallen asleep.

And then: “I’m going to win, you know,” she murmured coyly.

He jumped at her words, then turned his head to try and see her.

It was useless. It was dark out, and they had the shades drawn to ward off unwelcome visitors.

“Win _what?_ ” he questioned roughly, covering his nerves with annoyance.

“This war of attrition. You’re going to get too tired, or too uncomfortable, or you’re going to see a spider and come crawling up here with your tail between your legs,” she clipped out matter-of-factly.

He scoffed. “I ain’t afraid of no spiders,” he answered incredulously.

“Mm-hm. We’ll see,” she sang.

He didn’t answer, but thirty minutes later he was still awake, his neck hurt, and he kept feeling like things were crawling on him.

Lots of creepy crawly things, covering him and winding their way into his mouth and nose and swallowing him whole, their little red x’s shining like devil’s eyes in the night.

He knew it wasn’t real. Knew it was just his exhaustion playing tricks on his mind.

**_Blood in his nose._ **

**_Screaming in the living room._ **

**_Tears running down his face._ **

He swallowed deep, felt their little black legs run prickly and stinging down his throat.

_Not now. I ain’t doin’ this now._

He breathed them in, breathed them in down into the crevasses and orifices of his lungs, felt them make nests down there.

**_Something sticky under the bed._ **

**_A stack of baby books in the corner._ **

**_Dirty fingernails, pushing things away, trying to hide as deep as possible beneath the frame._ **

He felt something deep inside him clawing to get out. They were hatching, breaking free, they were growing and now they were coming out of him to eat him again, eat him from the inside out, and all that would be left of him were his bones.

**_Knocking the books over with a slap, a cloud of dust invading his nose and mouth as a swarm, a hive, a pack of black things tore towards him, huge, demons, with little red x’s on their back._ **

**_He couldn’t scream. He couldn’t let him know where he was, he had promised Merle he would hide, wouldn’t make no noise._ **

**_He had promised and he had swore and Mama had always told him it was a sin to break a promise._ **

**_But they were coming for him to eat him and they were in his hair and his ears and crawling over his Superman pajamas and they were going to kill him._ **

**_But he couldn’t move, the screaming was getting closer, the yelling was getting louder, the banging of bone against drywall was echoing across the world, the entire world was shaking, and he couldn’t move because he had promised and his Mama said, his mama said, his mama said, and Merle was taking care of him now._ **

**_He laid there and let them tear across him, and he didn’t move, didn’t breathe, stayed still and quiet as a ghost and covered his ears and closed his eyes._ **

**_And then the noise was there, that terrible voice was there, and it was all for nothing, it didn’t matter, he had found him._ **

**_Merle tore him from under the bed, lifted up the window and tossed him out onto the grass, his wrist colliding painfully with the ground as it crunched. There was a shadow in the hallway behind the room, he was coming, the noise was coming._ **

**_He stuck out his finger, his finger he still had, where the nail was torn. There was red, so much red, pouring from his nose and his eyes and his mouth, and he bellowed at the top of his lungs for him to run, go, hide, leave here and don’t come back, that he’d come and find him, promise, swear, go, be quiet._ **

**_He shook the spiders from where they clung to his shirt sleeves, cradled his hand, and ran, ran, ran until he couldn’t run any more._ **

**oOo**

He came out of it hyperventilating. The fear had his heart clutched in its iron fist and would not, never would, release him.

He clutched at the quilt behind him, gasping, squeezing his eyes shut so he didn’t have to see what might be there, what was there. He strained against the need to scream, the need to yell and run and _get away get away get away._

He felt a hand on his fist, jumped at the contact. Carol hushed him softly, slowly unwound his fingers, put hers in his. She pulled softly on his hand, and he slowly stood, his legs betraying him, forcing him to take her comfort even though all he wanted to do was run and hide like he had before, leave them all.

But instead he clambered onto the bed, buried his face in the pillow and breathed deep, tried desperately to calm his racing heart.

“It’s okay,” he heard her murmur. “It’s alright. Everything’s okay. You’re here. It’s okay.”

He nodded his head into the pillow, breathed again, tried to shed the spiders from under his skin, tried to breathe without them crawling up inside him and eating him alive.

Tried to tell himself that this was okay, that he had stayed with her through nightmares before, that she could do this for him. That this… This was okay.

She traced his scars with her other hand the way she had the night before, and the effect was so different. Before, it had been nice, if strange. Tonight, it was the only thing keeping him whole, the only thing keeping him from going back into his past, being swallowed whole by that niggling ache in his arm where the bone had healed wrong, sinking down so deep into the abyss he could never resurface. She was the only thing keeping him sane, this contact so starkly separate and different from anything he had ever felt.

And so he slept.


	12. Chapter 12

He woke before dawn.  
  
Carol's hand was in his, her other arm around Judith. There was an empty bottle on the nightstand, which meant she had gotten up in the night, and he hadn't even stirred.  
  
His heart hammered. They were both asleep, and her hand felt cool and soft in his own, small. Her hair had dried in soft curls around her face.  
  
Her face was relaxed, peaceful. She smiled softly.  
  
He felt strange, almost perverse, looking at her, invading her privacy by staring at her while she slept.  
  
But he couldn’t make himself turn away, not when everyone was asleep, not when they had an actual door to separate them from the rest of the group. Not when no one could catch him.  
  
And then the memories of the night before surfaced, all at once, avalanching, and he felt his stomach muscles all contract in shame.  
  
 _Weak. Useless. Disgusting._  
  
She didn't deserve him, didn’t deserve someone so…damaged. Spineless.  
  
He withdrew his hand softly, watching her face as he did. He held his breath as she grimaced and lines formed on her brow, but that seemed to be the extent of her disturbance.  
  
Now he had to roll off the bed.  
  
He had to get away. Maybe he could go out and hunt, or something. Go out by the tall privacy fence and take out any walkers he could.  
  
He knew they would want to leave today. Beth would want to find Maggie and Glenn. Tyreese would want to go looking for his sister.  
  
He didn't really want to go. He could protect them here. There was water, the fence was strong. There weren't going to be any more Governors coming their way with a tank, he hoped.  
  
It depended on who won that fist fight.  
  
And then there was Rick and Carl. Judith was in _their_ hands. They probably didn't know, probably thought she was dead, just like he had thought.

She deserved to be reunited with her father, her brother.   
  
He sighed. Breathed deep. Rolled off the bed in one fluid motion, landing soundlessly on the wood floors.  
  
He knew how to get out of bed, how to leave a room, without sound. Had had to hone that skill in the years after his mother’s death, the nights when Merle didn’t come home. And then, those long months when he was in juvie and there was no respite from the devil.

He breathed deep, and held his breath. Closed his eyes.

 _Not again._  
  
He blinked quickly, then left the room, closed the door. Went to go walk down the dark hallway to the living room, then thought better and peeked into the master bedroom.  
  
Two blonde little heads peeked out from the pillows, both sleeping.  
  
He sighed to himself and shut the door.  
  
Tyreese and Beth were both still sleeping, too. Everyone but him was taking advantage of a roof and a fence.  
  
But he had to redeem himself after last night. He had to prove to himself, to Carol, that he wasn't weak. That he wasn't worthless. That he could be strong, didn’t need someone to babysit him.  
  
And so he went out to hunt.  
  
He walked out into the deep blue morning and breathed deep. The air was thick with dew and growing grass.  
  
And the sour smell of gore.  
  
He heard them when he bothered to listen. There was a dull roar of thumping bodies and disembodied moans emanating from the wooden fence, the wood wobbling slightly as the herd thumped against it.  
  
He swallowed hard, his body going stiff, frozen with fear. They didn't know that there was meat behind that little fence, but if Judith awoke crying, if someone slammed a door, they were screwed.  
  
But he couldn't do anything. All he had were four arrows. He couldn't fire one of the rifles, if he valued his life.  
  
He was useless.  
  
He stood with his back against the door and prayed.  
  
 _Please be quiet. Please be quiet. Please don't wake up._  
  
He waited until the sun started to peak, turning the sky a cloudy blue-yellow as it arose for the day. The thumps were getting fewer and farther between.  
  
Maybe he could slip out now, take just a couple out and find some squirrels.  
  
He hunched over and ran quickly across the waist high grass, lifting his feet high to keep from tripping. He came up to the fence and listened for them, and when they didn't seem to be too close, he scrambled up and landed heavily on the other side.  
  
Six heads swiveled towards him, hissing and groaning as their bloody hands reached for him.  
  
He cursed loudly and backed against the fence, popping one in the forehead with his bow. He discarded the now useless weapon and pulled out his deer knife, holding it blade-out as they came for him.  
  
 _Temple. Thinnest part of the skull. Eyes. Not the forehead._  
  
The first was fresh, with a cap still in his bald head. Daryl snarled as he recognized the man he had left for dead. The bastard still had his arrow in his heart.  
  
He put him down quick.  
  
The next two were older, half rotted, blood soaking every inch of them.  
  
The next one was dressed in a bathrobe, with blood coagulating in her white hair at the ears. Her eyes and nose streamed red, her lips still dripping the stuff that had made its way down her thin nightgown. Her pale skin was torn in several places, but he recognized her. He recognized her and he cried out because she was lost and whoever she was with was probably lost, too.  
  
The next was an older man, same deal. And then a young-ish man, his jugular shredded and still leaking down his white t-shirt.  
  
And suddenly he couldn't hold it back any longer, he couldn't do it, it was all too much and there was no one to catch him.  
  
He collapsed on the ground and moaned and grieved for his lost friends, all the people he couldn't protect, all the people he had saved, only to be torn apart by bullets and teeth and sickness.  
  
It was him. It was on _him_.  
  
 _Mrs. Peters. Mr. Leurch. Jason._  
  
They were dead. _He_ had killed them.

**oOo**

He hid the bodies after he had calmed himself down. Held his breath as he dragged their three through the woods, then reached down and closed their bloodstained eyes and straightened their bodies. Crossed their arms and tried unsuccessfully to think of something to say.

It was all he could do. More than he could do, really. Hershel would’ve tanned his hide if he had been there, had known he was handling infected bodies without gloves or so much as a handkerchief to ward off the pathogen.

Hershel. He couldn’t tell the others about this, definitely not Tyreese or Beth.

But Daryl was pretty positive at this point that he was either immune to this certain flu strain, or he was just a carrier. He had had enough fence duty, had dug enough graves to have long been infected. Not to mention he was in very close contact with people who had later contracted it.

Patrick. Another little boy on his list.

It was getting harder and harder to keep track of, his list. He had kept it vigorously before and after the Turn, but now? He could only guess.

Before it had been easy. Mama. His friend Buck. Merle’s ex-girlfriend Dana.

And that was it. He had three lives on his conscience.

Now he had run out of fingers to count them on.

But they were there, and he knew he would be called accountable for each and every one of them. He had dreams of judges coming down on him with hammers, their parchment list of lives rolling to his feet and out the door.

_How could you have killed so many people, Daryl?_

_How could you have survived while they died?_

_How are you worth enough to live in the space they vacated?_

_You’re not._

He wasn’t. He wasn’t.

But he had to make up for it, had to make up for his uselessness, his weakness, so he hunted, brought down game that they didn’t really need, and plucked it and gutted it out in the woods, came back with it for Carol to cook.

The house was awake when he returned. Carol had the girls packing their things into the trunk of that little Civic, and Beth was rolling a dirty tennis ball back and forth to Judith on the floor.

Tyreese was going around the house, pulling blinds and shutting doors.

“We’re glad you could join us!” Beth called from the living room as he stepped over the threshold. Judith whipped her little head around and giggled, and he smiled at her. He held up the plucked duck he had shot near the river, and Beth fake-gagged, shaking her head at Judith. “Yucky!” she chirped in that voice she reserved just for the girl, sticking out her tongue and shaking her head. Judith stuck her tongue out back at her, and Beth clapped for her.

He continued on with his find, plopping it in the sink for someone else to deal with before they went.

Carol stomped back into the house, dragging her muddy boots on the welcome mat as she did. She caught him staring and smiled wide, batted her eyes at him.

He almost let himself laugh at her. Almost.

But after last night, he knew he couldn’t let himself go there with her. At least not yet. He was too broken, too far gone, and until he fixed himself, she would only lower herself to meet him.

And he couldn’t allow that.

So he let his eyes go back to the duck, and decided now was as good as time as any to deal with it.

He stomped around the kitchen, opening all the drawers to find the knife drawer, when someone bumped him with their hip, holding out a blade handle-out, lax-wristed.

He knew who it was, so he took it without looking. He couldn’t. He had to.

She didn’t act like she knew what he was doing, just sighed and turned back to the girls, helping them pack the new found sleeping bags into the crammed trunk.

She probably thought he was just embarrassed after last night, which was true. But there was so much more to it than that.

He would protect her. And he would fix himself. And then, maybe then… Maybe then, things could be better.

He cut up the bird into chunks, and then took a pan outside to build a fire and cook it. It was almost second-nature, this catching-and-cooking-and-eating part of their lives, but the girls were obviously not very well-versed in this tactic, and glued themselves to his side as he built the fire and threw the meat onto the pan.

Mika watched with a child’s sick fascination, her eyes wide, nose wrinkled. Lizzie watched, stone cold, head slightly cocked, eyes lazy.

He hated that kid.

They ate, and then they left.

**OoO**

The road was open and empty before them. There were still two evacuation houses they could check, and given the close proximity to the prison, wouldn’t take but half a day to check each.

The ride was cramped, to say the least. Tyreese rode up front while Carol drove, and Daryl, Beth, Mika, and Lizzie squeezed in the back, Judith on Beth’s lap.

Judith loved the car, loved the windows, was mesmerized by the sights before her. Beth held her close and pointed to objects, naming them softly and slowly under her breath, enunciating clearly and repeating herself a couple times.

She didn’t teach her walker, though. Daryl caught that much.

The second house had a wrought-iron fence. It was an old plantation home with big oak trees along the oyster shell driveway, tall pillars lining the front like the White House.

This house had been chosen for its sturdy fence and generators.

They knew something was up when they approached, and the gate creaked loosely on its hinges. Both the truck and the mini van that was left here was gone, and the front door swung in the wind.

Carol reached across the gear shift and took Tyreese’s hand. She glanced up in the rearview at the five of them in the back, then looked to Daryl.

She parked the car.

“Let’s go check it out,” she stated tiredly, her eyes flickering as she withdrew her hand from Tyreese and took her handgun off the dash, checking the bullets and flipping the safety.

Daryl nodded to her and took his crossbow from its place on the back dash, crawling over the little girls to get to the trunk, where the twin semi-automatics were.

They slammed the doors in unison, eyes both jolting to find the source of a loud moan. When the body stumbled out from behind the house, she turned to look at him.

“Ready?”

He nodded grimly.

**oOo**

The walker was old, none of their own. Carol sighed with relief and skipped to put it down, but Daryl wasn’t so easily persuaded. He remembered what he saw. He knew that anyone who had been sick had probably not made it out alive, or had been taken out on the bus.

They could be stumbling around that big old house, just waiting for someone to devour.

He walked up the steps, evaluating the marks on the banisters as he went. There were two bullet holes near the bottom, and a single set of bloody footprints that doubled and tripled over themselves chaotically, as if the person had had a nervous break and had started running circles.

Carol came up behind him, placed a hand gently on the middle of his back. He stiffened immediately, but couldn’t make himself move away from her.

“What do you see?” she asked under her breath.

He shook his head, fought to think beyond the warmth spreading up and down his spine.

He coughed, shook his head harder. “Just one person. Looks kinda small.”

She nodded thoughtfully and started climbing again, letting her hand drop.

He followed after her, his crossbow held high, his gun on his shoulder. They crossed the threshold slowly, but Carol whipped across her arm to stop him from taking another step. She held her finger up to her lips and pointed.

Daryl followed her finger and felt the blood rush from his face.

There was a dead man on the ground, his chest completely excavated of its contents. His face was white, not gray yet, and his nose and eyes leaked blood.

There were two other bodies beside him, another young man, and what looked to be a young woman. Their hands and mouths were covered in gore, their fingernails torn, their teeth clotted with bone and flesh.

There were clear bullet holes in all three of them, once in the forehead.

But that wasn’t the worst.

Daryl stepped forward to see better, and Carol practically fell over herself trying to drag him back.

But he had to see, had to see if they were his, had to see what it was.

They weren’t his, but it didn’t matter. They were on the list now. They would have lived if the Governor hadn’t come, if he had kept looking and found him and put him down months ago, like he should have.

Someone had written a message in the lake of blood, their boots dragging clear letters through the jelly.

“Only Ten Left Now. Going To Next House,” he breathed.

Carol brought in a shuddering breath, leaned on the doorframe. He turned quickly to offer a hand, to hold her up, but she warded him off with a palm and shook her head. Brought her hands up to her mouth as she took in the horrific sight before them.

“We can’t tell them,” she whispered in grief. “We can’t tell them what we saw here.”

Daryl nodded his head at her, breathed deep from his mouth to keep the pervasive stench of brains and death from his nose.

She straightened quickly, set her pistol down on the little buffet table by the door. “I’ll take the pantry,” she intoned solemnly, stepping around the blood as best she could to get to the kitchen just a few feet away.

He knew he needed to go look elsewhere, gather the flashlights and pocket knives, but he couldn’t let himself leave her, completely exposed, as she bent beneath the table to pull out the backpack that someone had left. She had just put her gun down, and what if there was something else in the house, something waiting and lurking, and the second he left the room, it lurched from the shadows and took her?

He couldn’t put her down. He couldn’t have her on his list.

He couldn’t do it.

And so he walked behind her and stood and waited, his bow hanging, controlled, from his palms as he scanned the yard through the windows, strained to see through the dark hallways.

She didn’t tell him to go. She didn’t even acknowledge his presence.

He figured she was probably just too proud to admit that it made her feel better to have someone watching her back.

She straightened slowly, slinging the orange backpack over her shoulder. Her chin quivered a little as she pulled out a little stack of papers, each no bigger than a playing card, and laid them in his palm.

He flipped them over and felt himself reflect Maggie’s smile. He shuffled the pictures quickly, finding ones of Carol and himself by the kitchen area, of Beth with Judith, of Michonne peeking over Carl’s shoulder as he read comic books on his bunk.

There was only one person they knew who could take these pictures, the only person not present in a single one in the whole stack.

“I think we can tell them this,” he answered, placing the cards back into Carol’s hand. She smiled and wiped a couple tears from her eyes, zipping them back up safely in an outer pocket.

“I think we can,” she wobbled.

 


	13. Chapter 13

Beth’ s eyes widened as they landed on the orange backpack, and he could see the fear there, knew she was already starting to panic.

“Oh my God!” she screamed, hysteria lacing its way into her voice. “Was Carl in there? Rick? Are they…are they…”

Carol smiled small and shook her head quickly, reaching behind her to unzip the pocket with the photos.

“No, no sweetie. Whoever was here left. They left us a note in there, said they were heading to the last house.” She pulled out the stack and then threw the bag in the trunk, coming back around to hand Beth the pictures.

Daryl held his breath in discomfort, waiting for the happy-crying that was going to ensue. He flipped the safety on his semi-automatic back on and threw it in the trunk, slammed it shut.

When he squeezed back in between Mika and Beth, sure enough, she was crying through her hands, Judith’s lip trembling at the sudden change in emotion.

Beth was crying too hard to even notice when he pulled the baby over onto his lap. His eyes flicked back up at Carol in the rearview, and she gave him a pointed look with those blue eyes, darting them towards Beth and blinking slowly.

He tried not to scoff. He really did.

But he did anyway.

Nobody but Lizzie noticed, but that was well enough.

“It’s so stupid,” she mumbled. “We know someone’s dead in there.”

Mika hit her hard and shushed her, and while Beth wasn’t listening, he heard. And he saw by the way that Carol’s fingers curled on the steering wheel, how she kept her head trained on the house in front of them even as she backed out, that she had heard as well.

**OoO**

The drive to the next house took longer.

The way the houses were set out, it took minimal time to run there from the prison.

But not to drive there.

The last house was tucked away in an offshoot of an offshoot of an offshoot of a side road of a sub-division.

It took forever.

Carol tried to find music that pleased everyone, Tyreese tried to play I-Spy with the girls, and Daryl tried to calculate the odds of who they might encounter at the last safe house, if they made it at all.

Glenn was likely. No one else would have thought to grab his pictures, which was the only thing they had really seen in their hurry. If Glenn was there, Sasha would probably be, since she was sick.

Everyone else was a big question mark. It could be anyone, and it could be no one.

“Aww,” Beth cooed as she smoothed out one of the pictures she hadn’t gotten to. She passed it up to Tyreese.

“They’re so cute, don’tcha think, Ty?” she purred, giving Carol coy eyes in the mirror. Ty belly-laughed at that, startling Judith, and passed it to Carol.

“I wouldn’t say Daryl could be cute, but together, yeah, they’re pretty cute,” he answered, his chest bouncing as he laughed.

He felt himself jump at his name, but he figured it was the one of him chasing Carl with Judith on his shoulders. That had been a good day. Everyone had been in a happy mood.

But then Carol coughed and blushed a little, and flicked her eyes up to the rearview to look at him.

“Shit,” he breathed, lurching forward to snatch it out of her hand that was already tilted towards him.

“Hey!” Tyreese yelled, turning around to grab it, still laughing.

“Uh-uh,” Daryl answered gruffly as he flipped it picture-down in his palm.

“Aw, come on Daryl,” Beth pouted. “It’s technically mine, you know. You have to give it back.”

He rolled his eyes. “Sure. An’ how’s it yours?”

She looked at him smugly. “ _My_ brother-in-law’s camera. He’s not here now, so it’s now my picture.”

“It’s got me in it, so I say it’s mine.” Carol answered with finality, not looking up as she turned onto the first side road.

Beth nodded her head slowly. She backhanded Daryl lightly on the knee, and he flinched instinctively.

She pretended she didn’t notice, kept her eyes steady for the most part. She motioned towards Carol, turned a little towards her. “Well. She wants it. Give it to her.”

He felt a growl start in his throat, but he complied begrudgingly, reaching forward to let Carol take it back.

Tyreese and Beth started giggling again.

It was okay. It didn’t mean anything. It was fine. Carol could have it.

It was okay.

Carol held it up on top of the steering wheel to look at while she drove.

“You know,” she murmured pensively. “I have no recollection of this being taken.”

Beth snorted.

“You think you would? Glenn only got it because y’all didn’t know he was there!”

Carol cocked her head and squinted at the picture.

“That was kind of rude. I mean, really: look at my posture. He could have at least gotten my attention first,” she grumbled, a smile contrasting starkly with her voice as she glanced back up at Beth, pinning the picture under the rim of the rearview.

“I do think we’re pretty cute, Pookie,” she drawled, looking back up at him through the now half-blocked mirror and batting her eyelashes.

Even the little girls erupted after that. He knew his bright red blush wasn’t helping matters, but for God’s sake, he hated this. He felt like his skin was being invaded, felt nervous, kept twitching his fingers. He was so uncomfortable with this and it was slowly breaking down his resolve, but he _couldn’t._ He _couldn’t._

They laughed for a while, and when they had quieted again, he decided to let himself look at the picture.

He stifled a groan. It was the one he thought it was going to be. Him and Carol were leaning over a carcass of something – maybe a wild hog – and Carol was swiping his bangs from his blood-spotted face as he bent close over it, trying to pull out an arrowhead that had broken off in the thing’s ribcage. He seemed to be completely oblivious to her hands there, at peace with it. They looked very _together_.

And, to be honest, when he saw pictures like that, it was no wonder the old ladies all thought they were together.

Well. Some of them also thought he didn’t even fly for their team, but that was another story entirely.

 _Had thought._ Past tense. They were gone now.

He made himself look away, but felt Beth looking at him. Glaring, really. She shook her head disapprovingly as she pulled out another picture, holding it black side-out. She cocked her head, and he scowled hard, gave her his best I-will-murder-you-in-your-sleep glare.

That seemed to startle her. She leaned away a little, and then tried to regain her assertive, scolding expression as she put the picture to the back of the pile.

Girl was smart.

**oOo**

The driveway was long and wooded, every turn a potential casualty. They had switched off the stereo when they turned down the last side road, and now they were crawling along on the dirt, dust flowing up behind them, waiting for each turn to be the one that would make or break their hopes and fears of the last several days.

They came to the barbed wire fence, the metal farm gate chained shut.

Carol breathed in deep, and he watched the way her hands shook, the way she smoothed her hair down every other second, checked her face in the pull-down mirror, looked over Lizzie and Mika in the rearview. She pulled out her gun as Tyreese jumped out to unlock and open the gate, counted the bullets, and put it into the console instead of the dash.

He hadn’t asked her about it yet. Hadn’t even breached the subject. To him, it was obvious: she would never, ever do something like that. When she told him that night, before they went to bed, that she had brought in Lizzie and Mika to say good-bye, he really realized how little time this world gave everyone. Merle hadn’t had a chance to say good-bye, both times he thought he had lost him. Rick didn’t get to tell Lori he loved her. Beth hadn’t been allowed to say good-bye before, and outright refused to when faced with it.

No one had been able to tell Sophia good-bye, least of all her own mother.

And he hadn’t said good-bye when he left with Merle.

He had lied to Glenn, saying Carol would understand. Not really lied, but he knew that the meaning he implied was not the meaning he meant. He knew Glenn thought he was saying that Carol would understand putting family first, but that wasn’t true at all, wasn’t what he meant.

Carol understood because she would have gone if it were Ed.

Because despite all of his terrible flaws, all of the beatings he had sustained at Merle’s hands, not one was made with sick pleasure, not one was made sober. He never took a blade to his skin, and he never failed to apologize the next morning.

Merle had kept him alive those first years, before he left. Before Daryl had grown strong enough to take care of himself, to cry himself to sleep and wake up, stand tall, walk straight, and hide the wounds for school.

Merle had done a lot of things, bad and good.

And he knew Carol would understand that. He knew she would know why he left, why he could not physically go back and leave his brother in the woods.

And here they were, about to, possibly, face people who thought she killed their own in cold blood, had disregarded their basic right to farewells and good-byes.

He knew she couldn’t have done it. He knew it with every inch of his being, knew it down into his very core.

He didn’t know who had actually done it yet, but that didn’t really matter at this point. Carol had taken the fall for someone, and that someone would just have to come forward and deal with Rick’s wrath themselves.

Rick wasn’t part of the Council. He shouldn’t have made those decisions inside the prison, but if he waited on the other side of this gate?

He would get _no_ say.

**OoO**

The driveway seemed to go on forever. The sun was setting, blinding them through the front windshield. Carol almost hit a small flock of buzzards that were feasting on what they assumed was a downed walker.

Beth covered Judith’s eyes instinctively until they passed. They didn’t speak.

But eventually, the corner they turned was _the_ corner, and three cars were there, shining like angel’s beacons, calling them.

There was a collective sigh in the car. Carol managed a nervous smile and looked up into the mirror to reflect it back to them.

Beth was practically bouncing in her seat, Judith yawning and whining against her chest as she did.

“Can you see anything? Is Molly there?” Mika piped in, her little voice high with both fear and hope.

Carol offered her another sad smile through the mirror. “Not yet honey, but they’re all probably just inside.”

Daryl didn’t voice his opinion, that if the little girl had been with Luke, which she most likely was, then she was long dead.

Long, long dead.

The pulled up alongside the other vehicles slowly. The front of the truck was smeared with hair and blood, but that could mean nothing at all.

It was quiet. It was really quiet.

Carol unbuckled her seat belt and drew her gun into her lap slowly. She glanced up at Daryl with pleading eyes and he nodded, knew what she was saying.

He nudged Tyreese and angled his head towards the door. The man nodded and reached down to grab his war-worn hammer, and then they jumped out to go investigate.

Daryl didn’t like the silence of the evening. Even the cicadas were quiet, which was both a relief and unsettling.

They walked up. Daryl peeked through the windows, but this house had already been prepped, so the blinds had been drawn, the curtains down. There was no way to see in.

So Tyreese shrugged and knocked on the door.

There was some shuffling inside at the noise, and Daryl held his breath. Tightened his grip on his crossbow.

_Don’t think._

_Don’t think._

_Just act._

The shuffling had quieted, which Daryl took for a good sign.

And then the doorknob turned and he breathed out a sigh of relief.

The door swung open, and Rick stood there.

The sight of him alone flipped a switch in Daryl’s mind, and he couldn’t be angry. He couldn’t beat him into the ground like he had wanted to. He couldn’t scream at him and threaten to take Carol away.

Rick was broken.

“Oh, thank God,” he croaked, nearly collapsing into Daryl’s arms.

Daryl held him up, felt the thick bandages beneath his shirt, heard the rattle in his breath as he choked on sobs.

He righted himself after a second, stood and wiped his eyes. He angled his head painfully to see out the door, but Daryl knew the car was blocked from view, and that nothing could be seen.

“Did you… Are you alone?” he rasped, bringing a hand up to wipe the snot from his nose.

Daryl shook his head, studied the ground. Silently begged for Tyreese to keep his mouth shut.

But Tyreese couldn’t do it. He shook his head, a big, wide grin, and stepped around, waved them in. He heard the car doors slam shut, counted them to himself. _One, two._

He waited. They didn’t come around the truck. They were waiting for her.

_C’mon woman. Be brave._

And she was.

**oOo**

They walked around, all five of them, and then Rick really did fall.

He yelled, screamed out, fell to the ground and then leaped up almost in the same second, and started running as fast as his broken form could take him over to his daughter.

Carol had taken a half step back at his actions, but from what Daryl had seen, he doubted the man had even registered her presence.

Judith let out a little squeal despite her exhaustion and he couldn’t help but feel compelled to watch them, to see how Rick cradled the little girl against him, talked to her lightly, checked every inch of her for injury, smoothed away her little auburn bangs.

Rick was everything he couldn’t be, and despite how fragile his brother seemed now, he was damn proud of him for holding it together this long.

His outburst had attracted the rest of the people of the house. The next to come to the door was Carl, sheriff hat blazing, his father’s Python gripped firmly in both hands.

Daryl still stood in the doorway, spared him a smirk at the teenager’s wry grin. He watched his face carefully as he moved out of the way, let him see the sight before him.

He dropped his gun, knees half buckling beneath him. He breathed in a shaky breath and stumbled forward.  Ran towards his father and collapsed alongside him and his sister, both crying their eyes out as Jude squealed again and reached for the hat’s little gold peanuts that rattled lightly when she tugged.

For the first time in a week, he had hope.


	14. Chapter 14

Rick and Carl stayed like that, wrapped around Judith, until the others came out of the house.  
  
Glenn stumbled forward  first, his hair plastered to his face. His eyes were watery, his skin pale, but for all he’d been through, he looked good.  
  
Daryl hoped that a smirk would suffice, but Glenn thought differently.  
  
"Thank God," he breathed as he took in the sight before him. He took Daryl in a hug that was neither masculine nor feminine, just very _Glenn_ in its essence.  
  
Daryl tried not to feel uncomfortable. Tried to hug him back awkwardly.  
  
He was glad he was alive, but it wasn't really a surprise.  
  
Glenn ran towards Beth and bear hugged her. He whispered something in her ear, and her face brightened exponentially. She dropped Mika's hand and hobbled towards him, sailed past with a shared grin through the front door.  
  
"Maggie?! Maggie!" She called out, already wiping the tears from her eyes as they streamed freely.  
  
He smiled to himself as the brunette dropped a dish loudly in the sink she had been at, called out her sister's name. She ran into a chair trying to get to her, and when she had righted herself, they reunited in a tangle of arms and tears and laughs.  
  
It was good. This was really good.  
  
And then Glenn saw Carol.  
  
"Carol! Oh God, no one even saw you..."

Rick’s head whipped up, like he’d awoken from a dream, and Daryl felt himself tense in expectation, balance on the balls of his feet in case the man was going to try something stupid.  
  
Carol held the younger man close to her, but he saw the tentativeness, the nerves that twitched her fingers, and he was angry all over again, so _pissed off_ that _anyone_ in their family could make her hands shake as they only had done at the quarry.

He dug deep for his sympathy, for the part of himself that loved Rick as one of his best friends. Searched for that grain of forgiveness he knew he had left, somewhere.

“…Carol?” Rick said incredulously, his voice cracking.

Carol blinked at him. He saw the way her throat strained, how her eyes fluttered and then focused strongly, her hand dropping to the handgun concealed below her belt.

Daryl’s jaw tightened, and his grip tightened on his bow.

Glenn moved away with a wide grin on his fevered face, but it fell quickly as he took in their grim expressions.

Daryl set his crossbow down slowly, knowing he wouldn’t have the courage to use it, straightening and taking a couple steps closer, just in case.

He wouldn’t beat him into the ground, not with Carl and Judith right there, not with him barely being able to stand, let alone fight, but if he dared lay a hand on her, even look at her the wrong way, he was going to _feel_ it.

Rick wasn’t saying anything. Carol wasn’t saying anything.

Carl was watching them both closely, fierce stubbornness evident in his eyes, the tilt of his head, the way he watched at his father staring at Carol.

Rick handed the baby to him and stood slowly, wobbling and groaning. Carol took a step backwards, but Rick held his hands high and shook his head, still silent, his head bowed a little.

Carol’s chin was starting to quiver. She dropped her hand from the little pistol and let her arms hang loose at her sides.

And then Rick was on her, taking her into him, shuddering and sobbing and holding her head against his neck.

“I’m sorry,” he wobbled. “I’m so sorry. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

Carol nodded into his neck and held the back of his head, and then let go. Extricated herself slowly, offering him a half-smile and nodding over and over again.

“He told me, Carol. I’m so sorry… I didn’t… I should have…”

Carol hushed him and glanced back at Carl, that sad half-smile still playing on her lips.

He didn’t like that she was accepting this, _smiling_. He hated it. She should be strong, should be angry. Carol had cared for Judith’s life when Rick had not, had done so much for all of them to have been turned away.

It wasn’t right.

But she was forgiving. That was the way she was, was the way she had had to become with Ed.

He understood, but he couldn’t empathize.

He should not be getting off this easy.

**oOo**

No one understood what the outburst was about. Once they were back in the house, Glenn asked point-blank, but Maggie silenced him with a shake of her head. Beth was curled against her on the couch, had been for the last several hours. Their whispers were never ending, turning to static as the rest of the group traded stories.

Molly was not there, as he had suspected. Glenn and Maggie were, though, and Rick and Carl. Mrs. McLeod was there as well. Michonne was holed away in the back bedroom helping one of the Governor’s soldiers – a nurse – care for a man they met on the way that had suffered a bite to the hand and had to have it amputated.

At the word that her help could be used elsewhere, Carol fled from the awkward living room to go assist with her collection of drugs.

There were two other people in the room, people that annoyed Daryl the second he laid eyes on them. The girl looked to be no older than Beth and was dressed so unprepared it was a wonder she hadn’t had a chunk taken out of her yet. And the man was army.

Daryl did not like army.

His very presence screamed “bully”, and the way he held himself, had his chest puffed out, arms crossed gruffly, he knew he had an ego.

All the army men he had known did, really.

They talked in hushed tones. Rick and Carl took turns holding Judith and feeding her, changing her diapers, relishing in all the tasks he had been burdened with over the past several days.

It wasn’t a burden to them.

The way they acted around her, how they spoke to her, only strengthened his notion that she had been presumed dead.

Well, of course she was presumed dead. They had met up with most of the people from the prison, and not one of them had so much as seen her.

Beth had searched high and low for the girl and couldn’t find her, so who was he to judge?

But they shouldn’t have given up so easily. They should have had some faith. In God, in Tyreese, in him…

Faith. He was a hypocrite.

Tyreese wasn’t faring as well as the others. When he had not seen Sasha immediately, Maggie had brought him away to tell him in private.

Glenn told the rest of them after he had left. Maggie had found one of the Governor’s soldiers in a borderline hysteric state and had taken pity on her as they left the prison. The girl, her, Sasha, and Bob had all left the prison together to go after the bus. When they found it, the only person alive was Mrs. McLeod. She had climbed the emergency hatch on the top and was perched like a bird, snacking on a sleeve of saltines, waiting for her salvation as the dead in the car below her banged and tilted the bus with their hunger.

Daryl figured she was a carrier, like him. She had never gotten sick either.

After that, they had headed for the train tracks, since the closest safe house was just off of them.

But Bob had been shot while they were leaving, and the blood had attracted walkers.

He had lost his whole left arm by the time they came upon the sign for Sanctuary, Maggie’s machete doing a less than stellar job of severing the joint.

Sasha was still sick. Bob was slowly bleeding out and in so much pain he could hardly stand. And Mrs. McLeod was exhausted.

So the girl – Tara – had taken Sasha and Bob to Sanctuary while Maggie took Mrs. McLeod back the way they came.

Which was when Glenn and the three newcomers had come upon them.

Tyreese didn’t take the news well. He walked out of the back room, into the living room, and straight out the door, said he needed to go for a walk.

Daryl didn’t try to stop him, and neither did anyone else. He was the only person that hadn’t been reunited with the person they had been searching for, and the potential for loss rather than the blanket loss didn’t sit well with him.

Daryl only hoped he wouldn’t head over to Sanctuary himself.

He didn’t know what to think of the situation. In all honesty, he could care less what happened to Bob.

Alcoholism rendered no respect in his book.

But Sasha... Sasha was his friend. He had worked alongside her. He knew Maggie and Glenn were close with her, knew she had a kinship with Carol.

Michonne came out of the back room around that time, wiping her bloody hands on her pant legs and sighing deep.

She sagged against the wall when she saw them.

She looked from Judith, to Daryl, and then to Beth and took in several deep breaths as she surged towards him with open arms.

He felt himself lean away from her instinctively. Michonne? Hugging?

But she hugged him. Tight. Held him against her and breathed deep over and over again, her hands tilted upwards at the wrists to keep the blood off of him.

And then it was over, and she moved on to Beth. And then to Judith, resting an elbow on Rick’s knee as she bent and kissed the little girl’s head and smelled her hair.

Something was very, very off. Quite frankly, he was terrified.

Michonne was hugging people and kissing Judith.

Well. Maybe people _could_ change.

**OoO**

Tyreese came back later that night, just as Maggie had started pacing nervously, ready to go tear after him into the dark and drag him back kicking and screaming.

He stomped into the big country house and collapsed onto one of the sofas, rolled over, and promptly started snoring.

“Well then,” Mrs. McLeod breathed, looking away with wide eyes.

Maggie smiled at her and set a hand on her shoulder. “You ready for bed?”

Mrs. McLeod rolled her hand off her shoulder and hobbled to her feet slowly. Maggie tried to give her a hand, hovered near her, but Mrs. McLeod slapped her on the butt and told her to sit on down, that she knew how to get herself into bed.

Maggie plopped down again with wide eyes, her mouth set into a thin, straight line. Glenn patted her back as he giggled behind his hand, trying to do so quietly without attracting attention from the retreating woman.

“I swear,” she mumbled. “That old bat is going to drive me to drink.”

Carl and Beth laughed a little at that, but the rest of them managed to keep their amusement down to a small smile.

And then Judith started her nightly whining that Daryl knew would turn into a full-scale meltdown if someone didn’t feed her and get her to bed, and soon.

Rick noticed, and slowly straightened to his feet, taking Judith and propping her on his hip as he went towards the pile of bags by the door, taking the diaper bag and heading back to claim the last lower level bedroom.

The army man and the young girl went upstairs soon after that.

Lizzie and Mika were lying next to each other on a heap in the floor, almost sleeping, and he realized all of a sudden that he hadn’t warned them, hadn’t told anyone about Lizzie.

And he only guessed that no one knew about Carl.

What kind of world was it that they lived in that the most dangerous people in the house were under the age of 14?

Because it was almost point-blank obvious to him at that point that Carol had covered for Carl, that Carl had in fact killed Karen and David.

And the more he thought about it, the stupider he felt for not predicting it in the first place. When Carl had killed the boy when the Governor first raided the prison. The way Carl cared for Judith, protected her like she was his last tie to his mother.

It made perfect sense that he would take innocents lives for the sake of others.

He doubted anyone else knew. Maybe Maggie, by the way she looked at Glenn when he asked. And of course Carol and Rick.

Maybe Michonne.

Who knew.

But he couldn’t sleep. He couldn’t go to sleep with Lizzie just a couple unlocked doors away from Judith, couldn’t let himself sleep with Glenn pouring sweat and radiating fever.

Carl hadn’t put him down yet, but now Judith was here. He couldn’t be sure of anything anymore, but one thing he knew, was that Carl would put anyone’s life on the line for Judith.

He couldn’t blame him, but he had to watch anyway.

And so he sat, perched, as Maggie and Glenn went upstairs with Beth, and Carl and Michonne went back to the other bedrooms.

He would wait.


	15. Chapter 15

Maybe they should just kill her.

She was going to kill someone, and then they would have to do it anyway. Because who could banish a child? A murderous one, at that?

The mental image of a grown-up Lizzie in a position of power, leading an army of undead and the living alike, left him cold inside.

He would have to be the one.

And Rick wouldn’t banish him, he was nearly certain of it.

But he knew Carol would never forgive him, would never be able to look him in the eyes if he did.

And looking at the girl now, while she slept peacefully, arms around her little sister, it was hard to be afraid of her. It was hard to believe that she was capable of horrible things.

But she was. He knew she was.

She had to be dealt with, somehow, some way, before they let their guard down and lost someone.

Namely Judith.

He stewed over his thoughts late into the night, keeping his ears peeled, trying to keep his tired and stinging eyes awake and trained on that little blonde head.

How different things would have been if he had saved Sophia. Just been a little quicker, a little smarter…

He breathed deep. Allowed himself a couple precious seconds of closed eyes to compose himself.

_It’s over. She’s gone._

It was something he had to tell himself almost every day, the same thing he told himself about Merle. That it was over. They were gone. They were dead, their lives were over, there was no more suffering for either of them to be had.

But he had failed them, them and so many others, but those two… They meant something.

And Merle’s, he could chalk up to being his brother. Would he have given a flying shit if he had not been related to him?

No. He knew the answer. Knew he would have rejoiced, like how Glenn and Michonne and the others had wanted to.

But Sophia was _important._ She was _special._ And as much as he had failed her those months ago, he had failed her mother as well.

And so he knew he could never do that to Carol. Could never… _take_ her child from her.

No. He would do his utmost, do everything he could, to keep them both safe.

**OoO**

Carol came stumbling out of the room sometime around midnight, wiping her face and holding a hand out to the wall to steady herself.

He started to get up to help her, concern lacing its way through his heart, but she smiled in her small way and waved him off, staggering to the couch to collapse beside him. She sighed deep and laid her head on his shoulder.

He felt goosebumps rise on his flesh as her sticky hair made contact with his ear.

It was good. It was okay. This was okay.

“Thanks for waiting up,” she breathed.

He shrugged, bobbing her head with his shoulders. “Had to. Had to watch the kids.”

He felt her stiffen against him, and he hoped his tone didn’t sound accusatory, because he sure as hell didn’t mean it to be.

She sat up, rubbed her face roughly with her hands, slapping her cheeks and widening her eyes.

“I didn’t even think of that,” she whispered, eyes flitting around to the hallway where the bedrooms lay. “Did you see where Carl and Glenn went?”

He nodded to where she was looking. “Carl’s with Rick and Judith, maybe Michonne, too. Glenn’s upstairs with Maggie and Beth.”

She breathed a sigh of relief and nodded. She glanced at Tyreese pointedly, then back to the girls, clasping her hands in her lap and looking at them for a few seconds before training her eyes on a point on the wall in front of them.

She hadn’t relaxed since his words, and he wondered if he should try and calm her down. Touch her, maybe?

He didn’t know, didn’t want to do anything wrong, and he couldn’t stand the idea of hurting her. Not again.

But then her jaw hardened, her hands clenched, and her eyes narrowed on the drywall before them, and he knew she was going to confess something.

“Lizzie tried to kill her,” she released, her whole body relaxing as the words tumbled from her tongue. “She tried to kill Judy.”

He blanched, tried to blink away the shock. He shook his head, breathed deep, and put a hand on her knee despite himself, not thinking and not caring.

She placed hers over his, her little piano fingers contrasting with his stocky, scarred knuckles like white over black.

He wasn’t really surprised; had suspected as much. But the words coming out of her mouth, the complete confirmation, rendered him speechless.

“That first morning, when I found them, she and Mika were back-to-back. There were walkers coming from all directions. Mika was able to take one down, but then her little handgun jammed and she didn’t know how to fix it.”

She breathed deep, dug her fingers into the couch cushion. Her eyes squeezed shut and she took several breaths before she continued.

“I guess Judith was crying. Lizzie put a hand over her mouth to hush her. And then she held her nose, too.”

His mouth felt dry. The mental image, of the baby’s face going blue while the little girl blocked her airways, just waiting to die, made the compassion he wanted to feel towards the girl nonexistent.

Carol pulled a palm down over her face again, tightened her grip on Daryl’s hand. “By the time I got there, Judith was completely blue and had almost passed out. I ripped her out of Lizzie’s hands, but the walkers were coming too fast, so I had to hand her to Mika while I put them down. Mika started screaming then, because Lizzie had held her so long she had forgotten to breathe and she had gone limp. Mika thought she had died.”

She paused, turned to look him straight him in the eyes.

He wouldn’t let himself look away.

“Lizzie didn’t do anything. Just stood there, staring, while I blew on Judy’s face and tapped her back until she started breathing. Didn’t say anything, didn’t look like she was surprised to see me, didn’t so much as cock her head.”

She looked away again, reached down to pull off her boots with shaking hands. Her breaths were too quick, her chest moving too fast. He knew she was probably on the edge of a flashback or a panic attack, teetering on the edge of sanity, ready to pitch off into the abyss. He had been in that same position thousands of times before.

Talking about it only made it worse.

She crossed her legs Indian-style on the couch. Watched the girls at her feet, her mouth quirking into a half-smile at the corners, trembling a little.

“And then she blinked, and just came at me, laughing and saying how happy she was to see me. Like nothing at all had happened.”

She hesitated then, threaded her fingers through his again, not saying anything.

“She ain’t right,” he whispered, shaking his head at her, trying to drive his point home. “We gotta do something, Carol. If she tries it again…”

“Carl will kill her. I know. Believe me, I know…” she drifted off. “I don’t think we should tell Rick, or Carl.”

He thought about it. It wasn’t safe for Judith to not tell, but it wasn’t safe for Lizzie _to_ tell.

“Maybe…,” she started, eyes watering and chin quivering. “Maybe it was just a one-time thing, you know? Maybe the moment just got away from her, and-“

“ _Carol._ ”

She whirled on him, bringing her free hand to her head. “I don’t know what to do, Daryl!” she whisper screamed, eyes blood-shot and watering, turning the light blue of her eyes electric in the candlelight. “I promised her father I would take care of her like my own, and I promised Lori I would take care of Judith – and Carl – like my own. _I don’t know what to do._ ”

He drew her into him without even thinking, without even acknowledging that hugging her meant touching her, meant her touching him.

She needed someone, and he was the only one there.

“I don’t know what to do,” she sobbed, hiccupping and trying to stay quiet, her arms wrapping around his core and resting on his lower back. “I don’t know what to do.”

“We’ll think of something,” he muttered. “’S okay. ‘S okay.”

She nodded into his chest and breathed deep, one breath after another, until she had stopped her sobbing and he was just holding her, her head resting against his heart, hammering away at a million miles a minute.

She felt so warm and alive and _real_ and even though the crap they were dealing with was possibly the worst thing the Turn had thrown at either of them, he would give anything to have her here, in this moment, with him.

He was bad for her, he knew that, but right here, it didn’t feel so prominent. He felt like he was being of use. He could hold her against him, and she would stop crying. He could do that.

He could do that.

She was quiet, silent except for the occasional stuttering breath that comes from crying too hard. He found himself rocking her slowly, just like he had done for Judith, clutching her tight and hugging her and letting his movements lull her to sleep.

Her eyes eventually fluttered shut, and he stopped his rocking and sighed deep. She was asleep.

But an hour or so later, her eyes flew open and she took in a fast breath, gasped, choked on the air she got, and fisted his shirt into her palms roughly.

The sensation on his back was so sudden, and so very different from what he experienced with her and so similar from what he had experienced at home, that he saw stars and rocked, had to restrain himself from tossing her, throwing her away from him, running and hiding in the woods, away from hands that tried to hurt and succeeded.

_She didn’t mean to._

_It was just a nightmare._

_Be a man._

She seemed to sense it though, and immediately dropped her hands, brought them to her mouth. “I’m so sorry,” she whispered, trying to make eye contact with him, her eyes still hazy with sleep but wide with fear.

He shook his head, glanced at her from hooded eyes and clasped his hands in his lap, not letting those thoughts take him over.

He wouldn’t let them. He wouldn’t let it take him over.

He wouldn’t.

He made himself take her hand again, give her a small smile.

He would not let her feel bad about this. This was him, this was his idiocy, his evil.

He would not let himself taint her.

_He would not._

**oOo**

They stayed like that, hand in hand, for the next several hours, talking lightly about the people in the house.

“Hershel didn’t make it out, did he?” she whispered to him, searching his face for the answer.

He felt himself tighten, felt everything in him contract and shudder with guilt and pain.

He had done nothing. He had waited and watched and then it had been too late and everyone had been screaming and crying and _he had done nothing._

He didn’t have to say a thing. Carol leaned forward and placed an easy hand on his cheek, her eyes clear and sad.

“It’s not your fault. Do not ever think it could be your fault.”

Her voice was strong, not shaky and broken like he expected her to be. He expected her to start crying again, but she didn’t, she was a fortress, so much stronger than him, and she was staring him down with that determined look on her face, her eyebrows drawn in, her thumb stroking his cheekbone as she spoke.

He looked away. Didn’t want to argue with her, because he didn’t want to talk about it. He knew he could have done more, and he didn’t. She wasn’t there. She couldn’t have seen.

He had stopped searching for the Governor months ago. He had stopped helping Michonne, and if he had just kept it up, just went out with her a little more, they could have found him.

They could have, but they didn’t.

He looked away in shame, couldn’t stand to have her looking at him like he was some saint, some angel that just needed to be convinced of his own righteousness.

He knew what he was. And he wasn’t what she thought.

She moved his face back towards her when he turned, shook it a little.

“Don’t do that,” she commanded. “If Michonne couldn’t have found him, than you couldn’t have, either. It just wasn’t possible, Daryl.”

Her words sent tremors through his body. It was the words he wanted, needed, to hear, but they weren’t working, they weren’t true, it wasn’t true, and his list was a mile long and none of it mattered.

“They’re all dead,” he croaked.

Her hand softened on his skin, then dropped completely to his knee. Her eyes were wide with concern, her face pinched and pensive as she waited for him to explain.

He took a shuddering breath, pulled his free hand through his hair and stared straight away. “This morning, when I went out? A herd was passing by the fence.”

Her eyes widened even more, if that could be possible, but she didn’t say anything, just waited for him to continue, rubbed circles with her thumb on the inside of his knee.

The sensation was distracting, but not enough to distract him from the horrible memory, the horrible image of his three friends, the sickening knowledge that they could not have been alone, that there were others that had died and were part of that herd, and their remaining families would never know.

He sucked in a deep breath, and released it with his words. “ _It was from the prison.”_

She sighed slowly, but didn’t move. Just closed her eyes and nodded her head.

“It’s the Governor’s fault, Daryl,” she whispered. “Just the Governor. No one else could have stopped it, and no one else caused it.

“You aren’t responsible.”

He shook his head, pin pricks of flame starting beneath his eyes. Shook his head fiercely and took his hand back to rub his eyes, his face, to ward away the tears.

He would not cry. He would _not_.

“I brought most of them,” he rasped. “If I hadn’t-”

“They would have died a long time ago in the wilderness, all alone,” she quipped.

He shook his head again, not really believing her, not ready to forgive himself.

He was despicable. He had killed them. He had killed every last one of them.

She reached forward and touched his hair, and he stiffened at the contact. Felt her slowly comb it out of his eyes, swipe it back, and it felt good. It felt soft.

“You can’t carry it around with you,” she murmured, looking at him pointedly as she said so. He watched her as she ran her fingers through his hair slowly, softly, and it was almost hypnotizing, the way she moved.

“We have to learn to let it go.”

He sighed deep and closed his eyes, let himself relax at her touch, willing his muscles to release their tension and to accept it.

She wasn’t going to hurt him.

This was okay.

She took her hand down slowly, then scooted down to the end of the couch.

“I’ll watch,” she whispered, beckoning him to lay down with her hand, nodding to him. “Try to get a little rest.”

He hesitated. He wasn’t really comfortable with being so close to her, to having her watch him sleep.

But when she was near him, he didn’t have the dreams.

He laid down stiffly on his back, face up. She didn’t touch him, but she smiled.

“Wake me up so you can get some rest,” he muttered.

She rolled her eyes at him, but he was too tired to care.

**OoO**

He awoke to kitchen sounds, beautiful noises that fooled his sub-conscious into thinking none of it had happened, that he was still at the prison, that the Governor had never came and killed and taken everything from them.

But then he opened his eyes, and saw Mika and Lizzie curled around each other on the carpet, saw Tyreese sitting up and rubbing his eyes. Someone had thrown a threadbare blanket over the girls, but they didn’t need it. It was borderline stifling in the house.

His first thought was that Carol wasn’t there. His second that she hadn’t woken him so she could rest.

He made himself stand, and stumbled towards the kitchen. Sure enough, Carol was there, the bags beneath her eyes large and purple, her hair a mess, but a big smile on her face.

He hated her self-sacrificing spirit sometimes. It was downright stupid of her. She’d gotten barely an hour of rest, and her bloodshot eyes proved it.

She grinned at him, and proudly flicked one of the knobs on the stove.

“Gas-powered,” she chirped, as she lit a match and a flame bounced out from under the metal grate.

He smirked at her, and she bumped his hip with hers, momentarily jolting him off balance. “Stop,” he growled, reaching for one of the boxes of granola bars that stood with all the other canned goods.

She slapped his hand and ushered him away from her.

“Go get us something good!” she whisper-hollered at him as she pushed him towards the back door.

He pretended to be aggravated, but in all honesty, her unmistakably chipper tone only made him feel better, made him feel stable. Her morning cheer was something that was constant.

So he rolled his eyes, still smirking, and went and grabbed his crossbow by the front door.

It was late morning, and the sun was high. The morning dew was evaporating into a fog that blanketed the trees and shrubbery.

He sighed. It was back to the same old thing. There were…15 of them? Not counting Judith?

And unless they wanted to start going on runs – and often – he had to do his job.

They all had jobs to do.

**Author's Note:**

> Let me know what you thought!


End file.
